What Was Not
by Onimiman
Summary: What if it had been Ahri Raas, the young Keshiri Sith Tyro from Christie Golden's FOTJ: Omen and Troy Denning's FOTJ: Abyss, who survived Abyss's climactic battle aboard Sinkhole Station instead of Vestara Khai? Then we wouldn't have a disappointing romance between Ben and Ves, now would we? And a few other things will happen along the way, too. Abyss AU.
1. Chapter 1

What Was Not

Ahri Raas scrambled to the SoroSuub yacht in the hangar of Sinkhole Station, fleeing as fast as he could from Jedi Grand Master Luke Skywalker. With the entire Sith strike team sent to kill the Skywalkers now dead–including the girl that Ahri loved, Vestara Khai–the young Keshiri had no choice but to flee. It would have been so much more satisfying to have stayed, fight, and maybe die gloriously in combat for what it was worth; Ahri could at least attempt a chance of vengeance for the lives lost, especially Vestara.

But that would have been fruitless; fruitless as the plans of Ahri's master Yuvar Xal, who plotted to overthrow Lady Olaris Rhea so he could take control of the strike team. Xal decided to enact this coup, of all times, during the battle against the Skywalkers; a plan that Ahri thought was stupid to pull off then, and which had resulted in almost all of the team members' deaths. His better judgment overcame his conditioned instincts to obey even those who would superfluously betray their own masters, and that saw to Ahri's survival.

Had he followed Xal's orders like a good little Sith should have, or at least would have, his death would have meant that no one would be able to tell the rest of the Lost Tribe back on Kesh that they would need greater numbers if they were to defeat the Jedi, especially the Skywalkers. The only thing that mattered right now was reaching that SoroSuub yacht, taking off, and heading back to Kesh so that the Skywalkers, and subsequently the rest of the Jedi Order, would surely suffer the vengeance that Ahri wanted to mete out against them.

In moments, he was aboard the yacht and its boarding ramp was closed just as Ahri was beginning to start the ship up. Not even Master Skywalker could stop him now.

That thought merely fuelled the newfound mix of pride and arrogance in Ahri brought upon by the fact that he managed to cut Skywalker and get his blood all over him; it showed that this Jedi who the Circle of Lords feared so much was just a man.

In spite of the strike team's failure, and more importantly, to Ahri at least, Vestara's death, he would be looked upon as a hero for this once he returned to Kesh.

~o~

Several days later, Ahri dropped the SoroSuub out of hyperspace and he was greeted by the pleasant appearance of his homeworld of Kesh.

Along with an armada of warships in orbit.

"Unidentified SoroSuub yacht," a velvety female voice said over the comm; Ahri recognized it as belonging to fellow Keshiri and Sith Saber Tola Annax. "Identify yourself or we will open fire on you."

"This is Tyro Ahri Raas, last remaining member of the strike team sent to retrieve the Sith Meditation Sphere known as Ship," Ahri replied immediately into the comm. "I'm reporting in to report that although we have found Ship, he had abandoned us and left us to die aboard a space station by the hands of the Jedi Skywalkers several days ago."

"And so you were the only one to have escaped alive, Tyro Raas?" Annax asked.

"I repeat, yes, I am," Ahri replied.

"This is grave news, Tyro Raas," Annax commented evenly. "Grand Lord Vol will not..." Her voice trailed off.

"Saber Annax?" Ahri inquired after a moment.

"Tyro Raas, during your escape from the Skywalkers, did you at all attempt a search for some kind of tracking beacon aboard your commandeered vessel?" Annax asked.

Ahri raised an eyebrow curiously. While the thought had never occurred to him after he left Sinkhole Station, he didn't think that Skywalker would have managed to put a tracking beacon on his ship. He thought about lying then, even though a Sith as experienced as Annax would see through his façade anyway through the Force. But he decided to stall as he decided to begin a hull test to check for a beacon with the scanners in front of him even as he asked, "Why?" He then noticed several Sith fighters flying in his direction.

"Because there is a ship several thousand miles behind you," Annax said even as the fighters soared past the SoroSuub. Then Annax asked, "I see that you had not previously conducted such a test."

Ahri didn't bother to hide his surprise from Annax in the Force. "I didn't think..."

"Of course you didn't," Annax said with a restrained tone of contempt in her voice. She was clearly angered about Ahri's incompetence in attempting to cover his tracks from any followers. The younger Keshiri thought that Annax would issue an execution warrant for his idiocy before she said, "It's a moot point either way. We conducted that test for you already and we found no tracking beacons to speak of."

Ahri released a sigh of relief before he cancelled his own sensor sweep of the hull. Then his eyes widened in shock when something quickly came to mind. "Wait, did you say a ship came out of hyperspace just after I did?"

"Yes," Annax replied simply. "And even as we speak, the squadron of fighters that High Lord Taalon has sent for it is going after it. Given your proximity to the area, Tyro Raas, you would do well to contribute to the capture of that vessel and remedy your idiocy."

"Understood, Saber Annax," Ahri said through his barely-controlled anger before he cut the communication with the other Keshiri. He didn't care what she thought then; he would do what she said, so he turned the SoroSuub away from Kesh and faced the direction of the squadron of fighters chasing the distant vessel in the distance.

Ahri throttled the SoroSuub yacht forward to help the fighters capture the ship. In a few moments, he was only a few dozen meters behind them when they finally began firing upon their charge. The young Keshiri spared a glance at his sensors, which told him that the vessel's name was _Jade Shadow_.

Ahri gasped in shock. His mind flashed back to his escape from Sinhkole Station. During his fleeing from Luke Skywalker, he passed by a ship whose name, etched in words at its side, was _Jade Shadow_. He had noted in passing that the _Shadow_ was being helmed by the younger Skywalker, whose name was a mystery to the Lost Tribe of the Sith. But regardless of his name, Ahri marked him off as the one who ultimately ended Vestara's life.

Nevertheless, the thought that ran through Ahri's mind now was that he had led the Skywalkers here to Kesh, the homeworld of the Sith, Ahri realized in horror. But how? Annax herself said that there was no tracking beacon on the SoroSuub, so how could the Skywalkers have followed him?

Then something came to mind. Ahri looked down at his bloodied tunic. It was still stained with Skywalker's blood. The young Keshiri took a moment to himself before realizing that somehow, the elder Jedi had used his own blood to track Ahri down. That way, he could inadvertently lead them back to the Lost Tribe!

_How could I have been so _stupid! Ahri thought.

But before he could help out the fighters in trying to stop the Skywalkers by even firing a laser, the _Jade Shadow_ disappeared back into hyperspace.

With that, Ahri figured, unless all of the Lost Tribe of the Sith moved off of Kesh, they were doomed.

And it would be all his fault!

If he told anyone in the Lost Tribe of this, he would surely be punished. Maybe he would even be executed. But if he didn't, not only would he be doomed, but his entire people; and not just the Keshiri, but the Sith and all their non-Force-sensitive comrades and families. The Jedi would soon arrive in the system in full force with an army, no doubt, and wipe out Kesh in a single stroke, rendering it uninhabitable for even a microbe to live off of.

Ahri had this bad feeling that this fleet wouldn't be sufficient to protect Kesh; the entire Lost Tribe was only spaceborne for two years! How could they possibly hope to defeat a force that was experienced in space combat? They'd be slaughtered like cattle!

Even if it meant his death, he should probably tell his people. Even if he were executed, at least the Lost Tribe of the Sith had a chance to live. Sure, it would abandoning their homeworld of their own safety, but at least they would still be alive; if not as a whole at least, then as little pockets around the galaxy at most.

On the other hand, he could just cut his losses and just abandon the Lost Tribe. What would he have to gain from this if he were to literally forfeit his life before Grand Lord Darish Vol and the Circle of Lords? Sith like Ahri were trained from the earliest of their childhood to strive for the excellence of their own beings, even at the cost of their fellow Sith. And while it was true that they were also meant to obediently serve their masters, Ahri thought that at this point, it wouldn't matter. Even if the Lost Tribe were to survive scattered out through the galaxy, it wouldn't probably wouldn't survive long anyway when the Jedi find them out and begin an active extermination for all Sith who wouldn't surrender. And besides, with Vestara gone, what good could there be in pledging further obeisance to the Sith, even if it meant the end of his life?

The one thing that would keep Ahri living would be to avenge Vestara's death by killing both Skywalkers. He would find a way to train himself if he had to if it meant that one day, he would have both Jedi at his boot heels, at his mercy, before he severed their heads from their bodies; just as the younger one had done to Vestara.

So, with that, he blew past the fighters and, having already laid a hyperspace course in, had the SoroSuub disappear into the blue velvet that took him out of the Kesh system. Let the Lost Tribe die, he thought. If it meant the continuity of his survival and the assurance of his vengeance, then so be it.

The Skywalkers would pay. Especially the younger one.

How he was going to do that, he did not know.


	2. Chapter 2

What Was Not: Chapter 2

A few days after his departure from the Kesh system, Ahri dropped out of hyperspace to the closest planetary port there was; a desert planet called Tatooine, which was set in a binary star system. A few minutes of piloting later, he set the SoroSuub yacht in one of the planet's outskirts, just a few miles away from the nearest town. From what he saw via a brief flyover, he thought that it was best that he not park in any of the town's spaceports.

He needed to hide, Ahri thought. Abandoning the Lost Tribe like that would not be taken lightly by any of its leaders; by now, High Lord Taalon or even Grand Lord Vol himself would have called a manhunt out for him. It would most likely be alive so that they would learn why he abandoned them. Even if the Jedi did come to Kesh and wipe out the main Sith body there, it was likely that even as he departed the SoroSuub, there were already Sith Sabers who were already looking for him. That's why he had to ditch the yacht and find some way off the planet; were he to stay, whatever party sent after him would also stay and remain on the planet until they found him. Leaving the yacht was necessary, but so was finding a way off this dustball, too.

About half an hour later, Ahri entered a cantina in Mos Eisley dressed in a new tunic; during the journey from the Kesh system, he had gotten rid of the bloodstained shirt by leaving it behind on the SoroSuub and had found a new tunic in the yacht's massive cargo hold. It was old and reeked of dust, but for now, it was better than a shirt that Luke Skywalker himself could track him down by.

Ahri took note of the various beings around him who varied of species and gender. Few took note of him, and even fewer left lingering gazes; apparently, no one had seen someone of Ahri's skin color before. Their curiosity must have settled when they figured that he decided to alter or dye his skin a different pigmentation; as odd a thought as that was, someone like that would appear in a bar like this, Ahri thought.

He approached the counter. The elder human bartender with a scruffy visage and an even scruffier look on that visage regarded Ahri with an equal mix of curiosity and wariness; the former was obviously a genuine feeling while the latter was something that the man had developed working here. No doubt he had seen many violent brawls here. Regardless, the young Keshiri took one of the empty seats at the counter and ordered an alcoholic beverage with a wave of his hand; he assumed that a mind trick would work on the man.

The old human only regarded the wave of his hand the same way he did to Ahri's odd skin color. It seemed he had quite a strong mind, the Keshiri thought. It was a moot point since the bartender served him his drink; he didn't seem much to care that he was clearly underage on most planets. It was obvious to Ahri that the law of the Galactic Alliance didn't mean much on a world like Tatooine.

After a few minutes of downing the ale, Ahri set aside his empty mug and asked, "Say, you know any spacers here?"

"What?" the bartender asked, confused.

Ahri reciprocated the look. He asked him a simple question, simple enough for a guy in his position to answer with an easy yes or no. But then it clicked in the Keshiri's mind. _Of course!_ he thought with a fitting mental slap to his head. _I'm still speaking Keshiri!_ He then struggled to find the right words in Basic to ask the same question. During the Lost Tribe's time of raiding and pirating the ships that would help them build their space fleet, members like Ahri came to learn varying languages from their captors before they executed them. It was necessary, the Circle of Lords stated, for if the Lost Tribe were to rule the galaxy, they had to know the dialects of those they would rule. Basic was the most prominent among those languages, and it was definitely one that Ahri managed to learn alongside Vestara and their fellow Tyros.

After a moment, though, Ahri repeated the question in Basic without sounding too much like a foreigner. He still looked like an idiot though.

The bartender snorted. "You don't look like you've been from around here. Trust me, I'd know a face like yours around these parts. Why don't you take the starship you already got, which you no doubt used to get to this very dustball, and get off?"

Ahri repressed the urge to snarl at the human's insolence. Mind-tricking him was out of the question; he had to find some other way to earn this man's help. "There were some... complications regarding that."

"Oh?" the bartender asked. "Well, I know a Bothan who could help out. Where is it you're looking to go to, son?"

_Anywhere off this planet_, Ahri thought. "Why is that any of your business?"

The bartender regarded Ahri with a look of incredulity. "You don't respect your elders much, do ya, kid?"

_On the contrary, you have no idea how wrong you really are, you Force-starved weakling_, Ahri thought venomously. Then again, he supposed that the human did have a point. He did just abandon his entire people to most likely die under the hands of the Jedi and probably their Galactic Alliance allies. "You say you know a Bothan who can help me out?" he asked, ultimately deciding to ignore the bartender's previous remark.

The human scoffed. "Sure. But as to whether or not I know where he is... maybe I do, maybe I don't. How 'bout you settle your tab right here right now and I forget how much of a tone you put on me."

Ahri gritted his teeth in repressed anger. He would pity the bartender for his petty desire for even a remote apology for the disrespect that the Keshiri had shown him just moments earlier had Ahri himself not been angered by such trivial desires. It was those desires and motivations that fuelled one's passion in the dark side and made them into a formidable Sith after all. Of course, petty accounts aside, the real problem was that Ahri didn't have a credit to his name here. He didn't really think ahead as to how he could even pay the one drink that he was just served; he was quite worried about the Sith party that was after him right now.

But before he could find a way of bumming his tab, Ahri felt a disturbance in the Force. He sensed two presences that he clearly recognized; Tola Annax and Sith Saber Gavar Khai, Vestara's father. If not for what someone like Vol would want Ahri for, Khai himself was here to inquire about Vestara's death. No doubt the human had sensed her passing in the Force when she was slain.

Ahri turned in his seat to observe the door. Just two seconds later, Khai and Annax stepped through the door, and their eyes locked on the Keshiri instantly. They wasted no time as they began veering around the tables of lowlife sentient beings who paid them little mind.

Ahri then turned back to the bartender, who, after looking over the Keshiri's shoulder, asked, "Friends of yours?" It was clear that he was indicating Khai and Annax.

Ahri didn't answer him. Instead, once he felt that Khai and Annax were just a few meters behind him, he launched himself into a Force-assisted backflip that carried him up and over the two Sith's heads. During that time, he whipped out and activated his lightsaber along the way. He aimed to decapitate them in a single swift strike, but they were trained and experienced enough to dodge beneath the humming blade as the young Keshiri continued to soar through the air of the cantina. Once he had landed on top of a table occupied by a Bith and a Muun, lightsaber still humming, it was then that the crowd had caught up with time to begin screaming and panicking. Strangely, Ahri noted at the edge of his awareness, relatively few patrons were actually scattering for the exit in a hurry, if at all.

A split second after Ahri landed, though, Khai and Annax, heedless of the reactions of all the other patrons, whipped out not their lightsabers but standard blasters. They fired stunbolts at Ahri without hesitation. In the instant that Ahri had to react, he already knew that trying to block these bolts would only get him knocked out; during the raids to pirate ships for the fleet, quite a few captains and crew members fired stunbolts at Sith that their lightsabers had no chance of blocking or absorbing. They simply passed through the blades themselves and knocked the Sith invaders unconscious. It did those individuals no good, for they were soon killed anyway by those they failed to defeat.

So Ahri did the sensible thing and decided to quickly allow himself to fall back off the table. As the stunbolts arced over him, he tumbled back across the dirty floor in a backward roll before coming up in a crouch with an unoccupied table behind him. He then used the tables as cover as he crawled and scattered across the floor and beneath the tables as a cockroach before he reached the exit of the cantina. By then, he had already deactivated his lightsaber and hung it on his belt.

Once there, he rushed out the door and out into the harsh blares of Tatooine's twin suns. He quickly looked off to his side and found an incoming landspeeder headed his way. He decided to jump into the speeder's way before launching himself up and over its incoming form to land in its open-topped cab. The Ithorian driver was the only occupant of the vehicle, so Ahri quickly killed him by braking his neck before shoving him up and over the cab before he hurriedly took control of the vehicle himself.

He zoomed past the cantina, briefly noting that by then, Khai and Annax had already exited him and were viewing his leave. They fired a few stunbolts to try to get at his head, but they missed and didn't even scratch the paint job of the vehicle.

Seeing that they would never get Ahri standing around, Khai and Annax looked to each other and nodded. They quickly rushed to their own landspeeder and hopped in with Annax at the controls. She zoomed off in pursuit of Ahri.

By the time Ahri saw that he was coming up on an intersection, with the road he was zooming on no longer continuing thanks to the small building he was coming up on, he took a brief look in the rearview mirrpanel to find that Khai and Annax were already on his tail. _Great_, was all he thought sarcastically before he turned left.

Barely a few seconds later, Khai and Annax's own landspeeder rounded the corner and was again chasing Ahri. With Annax piloting, Khai decided to stand up on his seat, carefully balancing himself with minimal help from the Force, and began firing stunbolts at Ahri. The young Keshiri was beginning to note that some of the bolts were actually zooming past his head before dissipating harmlessly against his speeder's windshield. So he ducked his head down as far as he dared without letting his eyes off the sandy paths before him, although he carelessly mowed down helpless pedestrians thanks to the speed and durability of the vehicle. For other landspeeders in the area, he quickly piloted his own vehicle up and over them, calling in all the power they had to their antigravitic thrusters.

After rounding several corners and travelling various sandy paths that all looked too similar for Ahri's tastes, he decided that this chase would have to end. Seeing as how this was already a high speed chase, the young Keshiri abruptly stopped his vehicle, causing Annax to stop her own vehicle, but too late. The front of her speeder crashed into the rear of Ahri's own, but by then, he had already backflipped out of his cab and into the air, quickly unhooking and igniting his lightsaber along the way. Khai aimed his blaster for the younger Sith, but before he could pull the trigger, Ahri had severed his weapon hand.

As Khai collapsed in his seat in pain on account of his burned stump of a forearm, Ahri landed in the backseat of Annax's landspeeder. The aforementioned Sith unhooked and ignited her own lightsaber in one swift motion as she leapt onto her seat and pivoted around to meet Ahri in combat. The younger Sith blocked the first strike while simultaneously kicking Annax in the solar plexus. She flew out of the vehicle and crashed into the backseat of the speeder that Ahri had been piloting. The split second after she landed, Ahri launched from his position and rocketed for the older Sith.

The latter rolled out of the way and hopped out of the cab as Ahri stabbed his lightsaber in the spot where Annax was just laying. He turned and also leaped out of the vehicle before clashing blades with Annax again. He then disengaged and backflipped away from the swipe that the older Keshiri tried to kill him with; obviously, she was now intent on killing him. It was apparent that she no longer found it worth bringing him back to Kesh alive, or in one piece either. Either way, even in his own adrenaline-filled madness, Ahri knew that he could not take on a more experienced Sith like Annax and hope to win. He needed a better strategy if he hoped to make it out of this alive, if at all.

Ending up on the other side of what was once the speeder he stole, he turned and ran into an alley. Naturally, Ahri felt Annax's presence behind him as she vaulted over the crashed speeder and pursued Ahri in the alley. The younger Keshiri then began leaping up the various staircases that scaled the sides of the two buildings between them that were facing each other. Annax was behind Ahri two staircases at least.

For a building on Tatooine, the one that he was currently scaling was pretty tall, Ahri thought. It was a good twenty storeys; enough for Annax to fall to her death and finally end her chase for him.

Once he reached the rooftop of the tallest building in the alley, Ahri swiftly turned around, and just when he saw Annax in midleap after him with her lightsaber ablaze, the Keshiri Tyro simply waved his hand and sent out a Force wave that blew Annax back. The older Keshiri then began falling. During her rapid descent, she managed to swiftly deactivate and hook her lightsaber onto her belt before reaching out to at least one of the staircases. But for every staircase she reached out to in order to break her fall, Ahri used the Force again to flatten the metal frameworks of the staircases themselves against the walls of the buildings, just out of Annax's reach.

After several seconds, Annax hit the ground with bone-shattering impact, and lay still. Ahri felt her Force presence disappear instantly; she was dead for sure.

A few moments later, Ahri began to descend the alley by simply landing on the staircases that Annax didn't reach for until he made it safely to the bottom. He walked past Annax's corpse before walking out of the alley and heading back for the wounded Gavar Khai, who was going into shock because of his stump. Spectators of various species only looked about in curiosity and a mild sense of fear without actually doing anything. Not wanting to attract attention from anyone, not even Khai, Ahri stood at the back of the crowd and, since all attention was focussed on Khai and none on Ahri, the young Keshiri used the Force to snap the human Sith's neck, ending his life.

Now back to the business of finding a vessel to get him off this rock. Taking the ship that Khai and Annax took was out of the question; the Lost Tribe of the Sith obviously had ways to track it.

At least he got rid of the search party after him.


	3. Chapter 3

What Was Not: Chapter 3

The _Jade Shadow_ exited hyperspace and ended up with its forward viewport revealing the heart of the Galactic Alliance, Coruscant. In an instant, the _Shadow_'s comm beeped. Jedi Grand Master Luke Skywalker, in the pilot seat with his son and Jedi Knight Ben Skywalker as the copilot, pressed a button to receive the transmission. Both Skywalkers were surprised with the speed from which the GA forces in orbit called them out.

"_Jade Shadow_, this is Coruscant Space Control, you are in unauthorized space according to the agreement made with Chief Daala," the masculine voice said on the other line. "Please standby and prepare to be boarded and arrested."

"Coruscant Space Control, this is Grand Master Luke Skywalker, captain of the _Jade Shadow_," Luke replied instantly. "Before you arrest me, I must be granted permission to see the Chief of State immediately."

"Permission denied, Master Skywalker," the same voice replied. "I repeat, standby and prepare to be arrested."

Luke raised an eyebrow with a thought. "Will my son be arrested, too?"

"The agreement has not touched him, so he will be free to go," the voice said.

"Good, so may he see Chief Daala instead?" Luke asked.

There was a moment of silence before the reply came. "What for?"

"The Chief of State needs to be informed of the new threat that the galaxy will soon face," Luke answered.

"Which is?"

"The return of the Sith."

~o~

Several hours later, after the Skywalkers allowed the authorities to arrest Luke, Ben sat himself in one of the guest chairs in Chief of State Natasi Daala's office. He was joined by the entire Masters' Council, Jaina Solo, and her parents; Ben managed to secure this arrangement with Daala after he informed her that he had information that not only was it necessary for her to know about, but for the Masters' Council to know about. Daala would have complained about the presence of the Solos, none of whom were officially on the Council itself, but she was a straight-to-business woman, and cut through that osik immediately.

"I hear that you have urgent news for me, Jedi Skywalker?" Daala asked evenly. Her tone still conveyed contempt for Ben just for being a Jedi, never mind the fact that he was the son of one of the Rebellion's greatest heroes.

"Yes." Ben nodded before he carefully–so he wouldn't put Daala on edge–took out a holoprojector from within his Jedi attire. He set it down on her desktop and activated it. He showed her the images taken of the _Jade Shadow_'s flyby of the Sith homeworld and their space forces before they had to flee the system. "During my time with my father as we searched Jacen Solo's path during his sojourn, we were attacked by a strike team of Sith aboard a space station. All but one of them died in the ensuing confrontation. My father deliberately spared the last one so that we could track him down to the homeworld that we suspected that we suspected that he would lead us to. Sure enough, after we followed him, he inadvertently led us here so that we could take these holopics.

"Chief Daala, what you are seeing here may very well be a modicum of the Sith forces that are currently mounting throughout the galaxy. If we do not stop this uprising, the Galactic Alliance may very well fall."

Everyone in the room kept their reactions to themselves as Daala spoke. "This sounds extremely severe, Jedi Skywalker. Do you have any evidence to back that claim up though, aside from these holopics?"

"Well... not exactly," Ben said.

"Then I've heard enough," Daala said. "I will see to it that the Galactic Alliance will send sufficient forces to deal with the threat that you have presented to me, Jedi Skywalker. But as it is, until I see more evidence that would indicate that we are facing a serious problem, this will not be a top priority for the government for the moment. I still see the problem of the insane Jedi that the Order refuses to give up for the sake of public safety." She glared to all the others before her.

"In other words, you're going to let this threat build up until it stands to bring the Alliance to its knees, Chief?" Han Solo asked incredulously from the back.

"That's not what I meant, former General Solo," Daala interjected.

"Well, either way, by the time you do amasz a sizeable flotilla to even combat thiz many Sith, Chief, it will be too late," Master Saba Sebatyne said.

"If you don't let the Jedi combat this threat ourselves, with even a little help from the military–" Master Kyp Durron tried to say.

"_Until_ I'm completely certain that there will be no further Jedi who will endanger public safety, Master Durron, this alleged threat of a Sith uprising will remain on the Galactic Alliance military backburner," Daala intoned. "As for the rest of the Order, you will remain here under my watch until, as I said, I see reason to trust in all of you not to pose a danger to yourselves and, more importantly, the rest of the galaxy.

"Is there anything any of you would like to say further?"

"Yes, I would," Octa Ramis said. "If I may say so myself, Chief, you're demonstrating the exact same attitude that Borsk Fey'lya and his supporters showed at the beginning of the Yuuzhan Vong War. You sure you don't want to reevaluate your decision, ma'am?"

Daala glared daggers at Octa. "Do I look like I want to reevaluate my decision, Master Horn?"

No one replied.

~o~

On Tatooine, the anonymous Bothan who was running a shuttle for Freedom Flight walked inconspicuously, as always, down one of the streets of Mos Eisley. He had heard, prior to his arrival here this morning, that there had been an incident in the town involving what appeared to be Jedi about a day earlier. There were three of them; two of them had died while the remaining one remained anonymous. On account of how remote and out of the way Tatooine was in the galaxy, even in spite of the fact that Luke Skywalker himself was born here, that news hadn't even reached the Core yet, so it was doubtful that either the Galactic Alliance or the Jedi Order itself had heard of this news yet.

That wasn't what was worrying the Bothan though. His main concern for the moment was meeting up with contact at retailer's store nearby and commence his business there.

Halfway to that store, some kind of large invisible hand wrapped around his body and pulled him inside an alley off to his side. He collapsed to the ground of the alley on his belly just as he felt that force dissipate into nothingness. The next thing he knew, someone was grabbing him by the arm and forcing it into a lock from which the Bothan could not escape unless he broke his arm.

"You run a vessel on and offworld?" a velvety male voice–an adolescent, the Bothan judged–asked in a menacing tone.

"Who's asking?" the Bothan inquired.

The teenaged attacker strengthened his hold on the lock, threatening to break the arm himself. "_I'm_ asking."

The Bothan blew out a breath in a defeated sigh. "What do you want?"

"A trip offworld."

"You could have just asked."

"Don't have the credits."

"Ah," the Bothan concluded. "So you really have no choice but to threaten offworlders like me, huh?"

"Bingo."

"So let me guess; if I don't help you, you'll kill me, or something to that effect?"

"If you want to make it that difficult, I suppose that would be the result. Do you want that though?"

"Not really," the Bothan admitted. "Well, if you are threatening me for a free ride, can you at least tell me where you want to go?"

Ahri Raas had thought about it during the time between killing Gavar Khai and threatening the Bothan. "Coruscant."

~o~

The Sith Meditation Sphere known as Ship soared through the atmosphere of the dangerous jungle world and, after plowing its way through canopy of trees beneath it, it landed as close to the volcano's base as it possibly could. There, it waited for its master.

Ship didn't have to wait long though. After a few seconds, Abeloth appeared from the gorge at the base of the volcano and approached the Sphere.

_Now it is time_, Abeloth telepathically communed to Ship as she approached. _It is time to unleash my wrath upon this galaxy_.


	4. Chapter 4

What Was Not: Chapter 4

High Lord Sarasu Taalon, sitting in the captain's chair of the _Emiax_'s bridge, looked to Sith Saber and fellow Keshiri Leeha Faal, who was in the communications chair. "Saber Faal, any word from Sabers Khai or Annax?"

Faal turned away from Taalon and checked her board. After a few moments, she turned back to the High Lord. "Still no word from them, my Lord."

Taalon sighed in frustration. "Do you know where they were last before we lost contact with them?"

Faal nodded instantly. "Yes, sir. Last they reported, they had tracked down Ahri Raas's SoroSuub yacht to a remote planet called Tatooine."

Taalon turned from Faal and looked to a human male Sith Lord in the navigator's chair. "Bring up a starchart to show us where Tatooine is, Saber."

The human nodded wordlessly before turning back to his station and obeying the High Lord's command. In a few seconds, a galactic starchart was brought up. The Saber narrowed the map's focus onto Tatooine via where it was relative to Kesh.

"Excellent," Taalon commented evenly before turning away from the navigator. "Helm, bring us to Tatooine."

"Yes, sir," the female human Sith Saber replied before fulfilling Taalon's command.

The next thing everyone on the bridge knew via the site from the viewport, they were in the blue of hyperspace.

~o~

The lights illuminating the night side of Coruscant, which was where the Jedi Temple currently was at this time, did nothing to brighten up acting Grand Master Kenth Hamner's mood on account of how this recent Council meeting was playing out.

"We cannot lead the Order against the Sith without Master Skywalker!" Kyp Durron proclaimed loudly in the Masters' Council's most recent meeting.

Murmurs of agreement rolled around the table from which each of the Masters were seated. The only one not to agree with Kyp's sentiment was Hamner. "Master Durron, Chief Daala was clear about her orders, and if we disobey them–"

"Oh, shove it, Kenth, we have to free Luke or the galaxy is doomed!" Kyp interrupted. Again, murmurs of agreement from everyone but Hamner.

"_Master_ Durron, you will refer to me respectfully and with proper conduct!" Hamner nearly shouted. "If we disobey Daala, then we will have enemies not only from the Sith, but also from the Galactic Alliance military itself. You heard the Chief!"

"To hell with Daala!" Kyp replied loudly. "That Imperial sociopath would rather subjugate this entire galaxy to the Sith than ever let us free to deal with them first!"

Hamner sighed irritably. "Kyp, I–"

"I say we vote out Master Hamner as acting Grand Master and elect a new stand-in until we have our true Grand Master back!" Kyp interjected. "All for it?"

Once more, every Master but Hamner said, "I."

Kyp levelled his eyes at Hamner. "Opposed?"

"Nay," Hamner said in a defeated tone.

"Motion sustained," Kyp declared. "Master Hamner, if you will please leave so that we may conduct the rest of our business without interference?"

"I will continue to sit with this Council in spite of any ridiculous motions you may pass, Kyp," Hamner said. "I will let you carry on with what you have in mind, but I will not leave."

"Very well," Kyp said. "I nominate Master Sebatyne to fill Master Skywalker's role until we have him back."

"I, too, vote for Master Sebatyne," Corran Horn spoke up.

"So do I," Octa Ramis chimed in.

Cilghal and Kyle Katarn also agreed with Corran and Octa. The Solusars, who were attending the conference by comm, also voiced that they would also nominate Master Sebatyne as leader.

When all eyes were locked onto Saba, the Barabel Jedi Master sissed as she usually did. "Well, Master Sebatyne," Kyp said, "who do you vote for?" At that point, it would be irrelevant who Saba chose to lead the Council; her vote would not matter on account of those who would support her.

So she shrugged. "Me, I guess."

"Then it's settled," Kyp said. "Master Sebatyne, you are now the official ruler of this Council and, more importantly, the entire Jedi Order. What are your orders?"

"We break Master Skywalker out from prizon," she declared, banging her fist on the tabletop, "and we take on the Sssith."

All eyes then shifted to Hamner. "Mazter Hamner," Saba said, "if you would be so kind to return to your own quarters until this Council sees fit to summon you again..."

"I'm not going anywhere," Hamner said, his tone authoritative.

"What are you going to do, Kenth?" Saba asked. "Challenge me to a death match over the leadership of the Jedi? Besides, even if you beat me, that won't win back any of the other Masters. In fact, if anything, you will only dig yourssself a deeper grave. So why don't you just make this easy on yourself and return to your quarters until we deem otherwise."

"You're making a big mistake, all of you," Hamner said. "If you do this, the Jedi will have enemies on all sides. Emperor Palpatine is probably laughing in the Force right about now."

"I assure you, Master Hamner, even if the Galactic Alliance becomez our enemy in the short term, they will welcome us back after we have saved them from the Sith," Saba said. "And, of course, after Daala is removed from office... by any means necessary."

"You mean you're already planning a coup while also intending to take on the Sith, Saba?" Hamner asked in shock.

"_And_ thinking up a plan to free Master Skywalker," Saba added. "A hunter must always think several steps ahead of their enemy at every turn."

"This is madness," Hamner said as he stood up. "I will not stand here to watch this order, this government, or this _galaxy_ fall into ruin while I am still a Jedi. That is why I request to fill out a formal resignation. I refuse to sit idly by while I do nothing when your plans will all go kaput."

"Request denied, Master Hamner," Saba said. "We know what you're planning to do; you think we're stupid enough not to think that you won't sell us out to Daala after you quit? Oh, no, Kenth. You will return to your quarters until you are informed otherwise."

"I will not be sent back to my room like some child, Master Sebatyne," Hamner said. "And someone must save this galaxy without having this Order fall into anarchy!" With that, he quickly whipped out and ignited his lightsaber.

Saba was just as quick to whip out and ignite her own. But instead of the two Masters engaging in a lightsaber duel, Hamner leaped out of his seat and flipped laterally to the window of the meeting room. He allowed his lightsaber blade to slash through the viewport and allow himself to fall out while the other Masters watched. When Hamner was out of view, the remaining Masters, minus the Solusars, of course, stood up from their seats and trotted over to the broken window, with Saba deactivating and hooking her lightsaber back onto her belt.

Hamner was gone.

"He muszt be stopped," Saba said with a predatory snarl. "Otherwise, he will ruin everything."

~o~

The Bothan's modified cargo freighter dropped out of hyperspace and was now heading over for Coruscant. After clearing the standard checkouts dealt with by Coruscant Space Control, the ship was soaring into the atmosphere of the capital of the Galactic Alliance.

And sending a Sith into it.

"I honored my part of the agreement," the Bothan said to his Keshiri passenger, who stood behind the pilot. "Once I drop you, off, I never see you again, and I can go on my merry way."

"Of course," Ahri Raas said in a tone that brooked no argument.

"Good, good," the Bothan said with several nods accompanying a relieved tone. "So... where do you want me to drop you off then?"

"As close to the Jedi Temple as you can," Ahri answered.

"Why not the Jedi Temple itself?"

"Don't question me."

"Okay then," the Bothan replied in a tone that betrayed his mild state of panic. Regardless, he turned to the direction of the Jedi Temple.

"That building right there will do," Ahri pointed.

Wordlessly, the Bothan turned to the building that the Keshiri pointed to, and immediately set down there.

A few moments later, the boarding ramp was down and Ahri was off. After that, the ramp extended back up and the ship was off, kicking up a heavy gust of wind against the Keshiri. The Sith didn't mind it as he stared off toward the Jedi Temple.

He noted a broken window on one of its higher floors. How did that happen? he wondered. Ahri couldn't imagine the Jedi erupting into violence against each other. The Keshiri imagined that it would happen to the Sith, sure, but the Jedi? As much as he hated them, he doubted that they would fall into civil conflict.

Then again, if that were true, maybe there was a chance that the Sith could defeat the Jedi after all.

Of course, that wouldn't be anything good for Ahri either way; if the Jedi won, he would be captured or killed for being who he was, and if the Sith won, he would be captured, and more likely killed, for abandoning them without even informing the Lost Tribe that they would be facing an enemy as great as the Jedi. So Ahri decided to take the only option that granted him a chance of ending up alive and free.

He would become a Jedi.

~o~

Luke had sensed the return of the young purple-skinned Sith teenager, who he had deliberately shed his own blood upon in order to track him from Sinkhole Station, enter the Coruscant system from his own prison cell here on the planet. The signal was weakened from what Luke felt; most likely because the Sith teenager had gotten rid of his previous clothes; no doubt he learned that he had led the _Jade Shadow_ into the system where Luke and Ben found the planet full of Sith. Alas, though, there were still invisible traces of Luke's blood on his body, which meant that the Grand Master could still pick up a faint sense of the Sith.

The Sith's arrival on Coruscant was a bad thing. If Luke didn't do something soon, like break out of prison–for, at this point, he could no longer rely on the Council, or Ben for that matter, on account of Daala's hold over them thanks to Kenth Hamner's leadership–then the galaxy would begin to see its fall back into the hands of the Sith.

But what was he to do here? All of his weapons, including his lightsaber, were taken from him upon entering the prison as per obvious procedure, and his captors were smart in making sure he couldn't use the Force; they had fitted stuncuffs on his wrists and ankles that sent out painful electric shocks whenever he used the Force, making it impossible to use the source of energy that made him the Grand Master of the Jedi Order without killing him if he used it too much. Now he knew how Tahiri Veila, who was also imprisoned here in this facility, felt.

Suddenly, the wall behind Luke crumbled away and fell into several pieces of debris to the Vongformed underbelly of Coruscant below. He looked out and saw the _Millennium Falcon_, with its boarding ramp down, hovering before the great hole made before him. Standing on the ramp, and holding onto the struts that delivered the ramp to and from the ship itself, were Leia Organa Solo and her daughter Jaina, who had clearly used the Force to pull the wall away based on their positions in extending one hand out to Luke's direction.

Once the debris of the wall fell out of sight, Jaina took out a blaster and aimed it at Luke. The Grand Master knew what his niece was thinking; so he raised his cuffed hands to give Jaina a better aim, and with the Force as her guide, she fired off a perfect shot that destroyed the link between the cuffs, exterminating the electric shock mechanism there. Jaina then aimed in between Luke's feet and again pulled off a perfect shot that took out the link between the cuffs there.

Now Luke could use the Force again.

With that in mind, he rushed to the hole in the wall before the guards outside finally figured out what was going on in this cell and the Grand Master leaped for freedom. Two seconds later, he landed on the foot of the ramp, and Leia and Jaina soon helped him aboard the ship as the ramp levelled back into place against the hull before the _Millennium Falcon_ dove for the underbelly of Coruscant. This occurred just as police airspeeders began to pursue them.

~o~

Just as Daala received a report on her desk about Luke Skywalker's escape from prison, Master Kenth Hamner burst through the doors of her office, with her assistant, Wynn Dorvan, trying vainly to usher him back out.

"Master Hamner," Daala said evenly as she looked up from the report she was receiving on her datatpad. She set it down as Hamner began to speak.

"Chief Daala," Hamner said, ignoring Dorvan behind him. "I have bad news."

Daala waved Dorvan off, and the Chief of Staff quieted down in his protests. "Would this have anything to do with Luke Skywalker's escape from prison a mere ten minutes ago, Master Jedi?"

"It has already happened?" Hamner asked in shock. "But there's no way that Saba could've arranged for that so quickly! Who helped him?"

"The _Millennium Falcon_ itself," Daala said.

"Damnit!" Hamner exclaimed. "The Solos were doubtless planning to help free Luke before Saba and the others usurped me!"

"You mean to say that you are no longer in control of the Masters' Council or any of the Jedi Order, Hamner?" Daala asked, horrified at the implications.

"I'm afraid so," Hamner answered, panicked. "And it gets worse. They're planning a coup against you while they also intend to engage the Sith of their own volition."

Daala fumed at the news that Hamner was telling her. "This must not come to pass. You were wise to inform me of this, Master Hamner. I will order an immediate air strike against them."

"What?!" Hamner reacted. "No! You can't do that!"

"Why not? I'm the Chief of State of the Galactic Alliance. I can do whatever I want under the laws of this government."

"But if you destroy the Jedi, then you'll vanquish any hope that the Alliance has of defeating the Sith!"

"We'll see about that," Daala said as she took out her comm. "Admiral Bwua'tu, the Jedi Order has now gone AWOL. I repeat, the Jedi Order has now gone AWOL. I want an air strike against the Tem–"

But Daala was interrupted when the window to her office behind her shattered into hundreds of pieces. The Chief of State instinctively leaped over her desktop and landed in a roll across the floor, getting up from a crouch in front of Hamner. She swivelled around and saw Kyp Durron now in her office with his lightsaber activated. Behind him, out the now-broken window, an airspeeder floated. Daala saw that it was being piloted by Corran Horn.

"I wouldn't do that if I were you, Chief," Durron said, nodding to the comm in Daala's hand.

"Natasi, what's going on there?" Admiral Nek Bwua'tu's voice came on the other line.

Daala didn't answer immediately. Instead, she engaged Durron in a brief staring contest before she raised the comm in her hand up to face. "Belay my order, Admiral. I'll take care of things from here." Before she could give Bwua'tu a chance to reply, she cancelled the communication and put the device back in her pocket.

"Very good, Daala," Durron said. "Now all we want is one thing; for you to let us go so we can deal with the Sith. We won't ask you to give us any military help, though it would be appreciated if you did. But if you release control of us right now, we will not turn against the Alliance, and if anything, we will save the galaxy."

Daala snorted contemptuously. "And how are you going to convince me to do that, Master Durron? Especially when the worst thing you can do is kill me, by which point you would turn the government against you anyway. So you can't win here. Oh, and have you forgotten that I have quite a substantial military force currently orbiting Coruscant right now, ready to blow you to all nine Corellian hells at my command? Never mind the fact that you still have Jedi Knights going crazy and threatening to tear this government apart."

Durron sighed. "Fine, Daala. If that's the way you wanna play it." Then he took out a comm from his robes. "Master Sebatyne, this is Master Durron. Come in."

"Mazter Sebatyne here," the Barabel Master's voice came from the other line.

"We're too late, Master Hamner beat us to the punch, and obviously, Daala's not willing to cooperate," Durron explained. "Which means we have to depart the Jedi Temple immediately."

"Then how are we going to get past the military forces in space?" Sebatyne asked. "We're not strong enough for that!"

Daala smirked at that statement, as if in summation as to why she would be the one to come out the victor in this.

"I'll see if there's some way I can persuade the Chief of State to cooperate with us after all," Durron said. "I'll report back when I've succeeded. Master Durron out." He clicked the comm off and replaced it in his robes.

"Whatever you're planning, it's not going to work, Master Durron," Daala said.

"Oh, yeah? We'll see about that," Durron said before he leaped over the desk.

Durron's plan was to soar past Daala and Hamner and accost Dorvan, threatening to kill the Chief of Staff if Daala didn't cooperate; the Chief of State was militaristic and would give her life even if it meant any amount of destabilisation of the government she was running so that her enemies wouldn't get their way. But when it came to another person's life, particularly a civilian like Dorvan, even Daala wouldn't be so callous enough to sacrifice his life to make sure that the Jedi didn't get to depart Coruscant and engage the Sith. At least that's what Durron thought; for all he knew, Daala could have been that callous; after all, she hadn't demonstrated that kind of humility in either her career as a military officer or as the leader of a galaxy-spanning government.

But Durron didn't have the chance to test the limits of the Chief of State's sympathy, for behind her, Hamner leaped over the Daala, simultaneously activating his lightsaber and meeting Durron in midair. They clashed sabers immediately, with Hamner forcing Durron down on top of Daala's desk. The two Jedi Masters struggled in the lock that they had placed their weapons in before Durron ended it by kneeling into Hamner's solar plexus. The older Master stumbled back before Durron pushed himself off the desk and stared Hamner down as the latter recovered from the blow.

"I don't wanna hurt you, Kenth," Durron said.

"The sentiment is shared, Kyp, but I can't have you or the others threaten the stability of the Galactic Alliance!" Hamner exclaimed before he rushed in to engage Durron in a duel.

Meanwhile, during the opening of the confrontation, Daala and Dorvan exited the office, with the former pulling out her comm and activated it. "Admiral Bwua'tu, airstrike against the Jedi Temple pronto. Daala out." Again, she didn't allow the admiral to reply before she cut the comm, replaced it, and continued to flee to the building's panic room with Dorvan.

"I don't think that was such a good idea, Chief," her Chief of Staff commented while they were still running to the panic room.

"Now you're starting to sound like Hamner," Daala remarked. "This is war now, Wynn. Even with this new alleged threat by this planet full of Sith, we can't take chances with the Jedi, especially not with their barvy Knights."

~o~

While Kyp and Hamner duelled, Corran Horn noted from the pilot seat of the floating airspeeder that Daala and Dorvan had escaped the confrontation. So the Corellian Jedi Master set the speeder on autopilot before he jumped out, soared through the broken window, and rushed past his duelling colleagues who didn't take note of his presence as he went after the Chiefs of State and Staff respectively.

As Daala and Dorvan continued to flee, they reached the turbolift that would take them into the building's basement, and subsequently the panic room. The Chief of State hurriedly pressed the button, and she and her Chief of Staff waited impatiently as the lift began to rise up to their level from the ground floor.

But soon, the two of them looked behind and found Corran rushing in for them. His lightsaber still hung deactivated at his belt, but he would no doubt use it if he thought it was necessary to at least stop Daala. Fortunately, before the Jedi Master was halfway down the hall toward them, the turbolift doors departed behind Daala and Dorvan, and they rushed in. Again, Daala pushed the button to go the basement, and the doors closed too slowly for her tastes. But they closed fast enough so that Corran wouldn't get through.

But that didn't stop the Jedi Master. Upon reaching the double doors, he took out and activated his lightsaber, cutting a man-sized hole into the double doors before kicking the pieces outward. He peered through the hole to watch the pieces fall on top of the descending turbolift.

Had he the ability for telekinesis like all the other Masters, Corran could easily jump after the turbolift containing Daala and Dorvan and cushion his landing once he reached it. But since he didn't have that ability, he had to resort to a trick he had once used on the living world of Zonama Sekot about fifteen years earlier in pursuit of the Yuuzhan Vong known as Nom Anor.

~o~

The duel between Kyp and Hamner appeared to be a stalemate as they continued to clash blades for nearly two whole minutes before the latter Master managed to find an opening and used the Force to propel his opponent out the window. Kyp then soared back before crashing into the side of the pilotless airspeeder, which sent him inadvertently backflipping into its cab. He lay sprawled laterally across the pilot and copilot seats as Hamner propelled himself with the Force out the window to continue the duel against Kyp.

The latter managed to catch his opponent's blade with his own before placing a foot into Hamner's solar plexus. But instead of kicking, he quickly lifted him up and over his head, sending the older Jedi Master plummeting over the edge of the speeder.

Kyp turned onto his belly and peered over the speeder from which he propelled Hamner off. He expected, much to what grief he would have accumulated over his fellow Master's death, for Hamner to continue falling to his death, which would have been in Vongformed territory below. But the older Master had managed to catch a passing airspeeder before Kyp could get a view of him from the speeder that he was now in, and now Hamner was leaping on top of other passing speeders as he was headed back for Kyp.

The younger Master, not questioning why Corran wasn't here for the moment, immediately sat himself in the pilot seat and took control of the airspeeder. He then veered away from Hamner's direction, and soared off. However, the latter Master was able to grab onto the rear bumper of the speeder, and against the wind rushing past him, he managed to pull himself into the backseat of the vehicle, his lightsaber still activated and humming.

The noise of the older Master's glowing blade was what caused Kyp to look into his rearview mirror to catch the sight of Hamner preparing to split the younger Master's head open. So Kyp whipped out and activated his own saber, once again blocking Hamner's strike before he swerved the speeder around, hoping to throw the older man off. But the move only caused the standing Master to wobble only; he had evidently rooted himself into the backseat of the speeder for just this reason, Kyp thought.

So Kyp decided to do the one thing that might finally get rid of Hamner much to his own reluctance; risk getting rid of himself in the process.

He abandoned the pilot seat and controls without reverting it back to autopilot–he didn't have time for that anyway–and jumped up to his feet while simultaneously turning around to better continue his fight with Hamner. The two of them continued to clash blades even as the airspeeder veered downward and out of control. Although his concentration and Force senses were heavily preoccupied at the moment in dealing with Hamner, Kyp still relied on those very senses to warn him of when the speeder would crash, and he would have to abandon it in time.

After several seconds, Kyp's danger sense buzzed and he leapt up over a swipe to his legs by Hamner. He kicked up the older man's jaw with both feet, even though it didn't knock him off the airspeeder; but Kyp was counting on that. So the younger Master took advantage of his split-second momentum to backflip back and ended up in the backseat of the airspeeder owned by an Ithorian couple, who were both up front. Kyp jumped off to end up hanging on the hull of another nearby speeder while the speeder with Hamner in it...

Crashed into the rear side end of a bus with no passengers. While the bus pilot managed to right his large vehicle in spite of the crash, the pilotless speeder with Hamner flipped up and over. The Jedi Master still had himself rooted to the speeder in spite of the surprise of the crash, but that proved his untimely demise when the arc of the upturned vehicle sent his body to be plowed in by the forward bumper of another speeder.

As for the airspeeder from which Hamner died upon, it continued its out-of-control trajectory, continuously flipping end-over-end without crashing into anymore vehicles in its continued descent. From atop a nearby rooftop, Kyp viewed a small explosion that had to have come from the Vongformed underbelly of Coruscant before he turned off into the distance.

"Goodbye," he whispered in memory of Hamner before he turned and headed back to the building where Corran was probably still after Daala.

But just when he was in midair in the process of jumping between buildings, he lost momentum and concentration in the Force when it sent him a burst of pain in his mind; a disturbance that he wasn't in the right mind to contemplate before he found himself falling to his death.

~o~

"Thank you, Admiral Bwua'tu," Saba said to the comm that showed the old Bothan. "You have the galaxy's best interests at heart." With that, she cut the communication and placed it back into her robes.

"Good thing we had Bwua'tu's nephew here," Octa Ramis commented as she, Saba, Cilghal, and Kyle Katarn stood in the hangar bay of the Jedi Temple, where Knights and apprentices all around them continued to either scramble to their StealthX fighters or other duties related to the impending launch. "Otherwise, we'd've been creamed in no time."

"And he won't fire upon any of us if there's even a chance that any of the fighters from the fleet he sends against us will kill Yantahar," Kyle commented wryly.

"Which means we still have some allies in the Alliance," Cilghal added.

"Yes, but I doubt Bwua'tu will be in charge for long in disobeying Daala," Saba said. "He'll be replaced once Daala finds out, and then we'll have hell to pay."

Suddenly, all four Masters felt a disturbance in the Force. It disappeared as quickly as it came, and then they all looked at each other in shock.

"Master Hamner... he's gone," Cilghal said mournfully.

Saba was the first to recover from the shock rationally. "We cannot mourn for him at a time like this. We must keep together if we are to pull through with this."

The other Masters nodded reluctantly but in agreement.

"Then let's not waste anymore time," Ramis said. "Master Sebatyne, shall we go now?"

Taking a quick look around the hangar, she saw that there were only a few Knights and apprentices here and there who were still hurrying for their StealthXs. She looked back to her fellow Masters. "Yes, we must go now." With that, she and her fellow Masters scrambled for their reserved fighters.

But none of them made it halfway to their fighters before they felt another loss in the Force.

~o~

While Kyp and Hamner were still duelling in the skies of Coruscant, Daala and Dorvan exited the turbolift that brought them to the basement of the government building. But after they walked a few meters down the well-lit, sparse hallway before them, they stopped in their tracks when they heard a laser blade cutting metal. They turned around and watched as a silver lightsaber blade cut a circular hole in the double doors. When the blade disappeared out of sight, the pieces of the double door fell out in Daala and Dorvan's direction, and Corran Horn emerged, his lightsaber at the ready. He was missing his robe though, indicating that he had used it to somehow reach the turbolift without inadvertently killing himself in his chase for Daala.

But before Corran could say anything, uniformed Galactic Alliance Security members stepped out of hidden alcoves and doors in the sides of the hall, levelling weapons up against the Jedi Master.

"Open fire," Daala ordered before turning back with Dorvan and they continued to scramble down the hall for the panic room.

While they did that, the security guards began shooting at Corran with their standard issue two-handed blaster rifles. And as quick as he was in the Force and with his lightsaber, all of his fancy, acrobatic dodging and often-fatally ricocheting blaster bolts back at his attackers, eventually, before even half of this squad of troopers were down for the count, a few of the lucky officers managed to get a few hits in on his torso. The lucky shots sent him sprawling across the floor.

He was dead before he totally collapsed.

~o~

After Leia recovered from the second wince of pain, she, sitting in the copilot seat as usual, finally answered Han's worried expression.

"It's Kenth and Corran," she said, already grieving. "They're both dead."

Han's face grew grim, but he turned back to pilot the _Millennium Falcon_ as it continued through the Vongformed underworld of Coruscant for the Jedi Temple.

~o~

Kyp was close to becoming the third Jedi Master to die today, he knew, as he continued to fall to the underbelly of Coruscant, just like the airspeeder that Hamner died on. But his fall was soon broken as he crashed on top of the airtaxi after a ten meter drop. He rolled across the length of the taxi before rolling off the edge and grabbing onto the roof. He lost his handholds on it, but he didn't fall far before he grabbed hold of the taxi's rear bumper.

The Jedi Master rode at the back of the cab, essentially bumming a ride in secret, before he soon dropped onto the roof of a nearby building. And he landed just in time to view the Jedi Temple as it began vomiting StealthX fighters into the night sky of Coruscant; Kyp could just barely see their silhouetted forms amidst the darkened skies.

However, before the stream of StealthXs could conclude, laser strikes and missiles from orbit began to bombard the Temple. Several StealthXs began joining the Temple in the ensuing destruction.

~o~

A slab of metal debris from the orbital bombardment of the Jedi Temple rocketed for Ahri Raas, who was now on the steps of the Temple. He backflipped from the incoming debris, and upon landing at the bottom of the stairs, he turned and began running away.

Once he had gotten far away from the bombardment range, however, he turned back and watched in awe, shock, and merriment as he viewed the destruction of the home of the Jedi Order. Ahri revelled as he felt the deaths of the Jedi coming out of their grand house in their StealthXs, joining the Temple as it was steadily being reduced to debris.

The young Keshiri's enjoyment of this great event was cut short when he felt two particularly familiar presences in the Force nearby. He turned where he stood and watched as a matte-grey, scored-and-scorched saucer-shaped YT-1300 light freighter soared in for him.

The Skywalkers were aboard that ship.

And they knew that he was here, and they were coming for him. He first thought that they would continue to head for the Temple in order to help out their fellow Jedi, but he could feel the intention of the presences aboard that ship; that while they would deal with the crisis at the Temple, Ahri would also be a top priority in the matter.

So Ahri turned away and began running. He noted a male Devaronian going for his parked open-topped landspeeder nearby; so the Keshiri ran up behind the Devaronian while simultaneously whipping and activating his lightsaber, cut the alien down the middle in two, quickly bent down to grab his keys from his pocket, and continued for the speeder. After he powered the vehicle up, he zoomed off.

In response, the _Millennium Falcon_ turned away from its path for the Jedi Temple and gave chase for the speeder that Ahri stole. It managed to catch up and as it appeared to float where it was relative to the landspeeder, the _Falcon_'s boarding ramp lowered, and Ben Skywalker allowed himself to slide down before reaching the bottom and grabbing one of the ramp's support struts with one hand.

With his free hand, Ben reached out with the Force and sent out an invisible wave that abruptly stopped the speeder by crashing its underside against the pavement beneath it. It skidded across the ground for a while before it tipped forward on its front bumper and began to flip so that it would crash on its top and kill the Keshiri driving it.

But Ahri used the Force to propel himself out of the speeder and roll across the ground well ahead of the speeder that crashed a mere two seconds later. He came up in a crouch and turned in it as he watched the _Falcon_ drop from the air and glide about ten meters from the ground. And just as it was above Ahri, the young Skywalker whipped out and ignited his lightsaber before releasing himself from the vessel and descend for Ahri. As Ben descended away, the _Falcon_ turned away and resumed its course for the bombarded Jedi Temple.

The young Sith whipped out and activated his lightsaber in less than a second and was able to take two steps back and block Skywalker's incoming strike.

As the two teenagers stared each other down with their grinded teeth bared, they pushed off each other, sending the other stumbling back a few steps before they rushed back in, meeting halfway in yet another clash, and another, and another.

At that point, the clashes became almost uncountable as the duel between them was on.

~o~

High Lord Taalon walked with two female Sabers at his side, one a Keshiri and the other a human, as they entered one of Tatooine's local cantinas. They had already located the SoroSuub that Ahri Raas was sighted as piloting from the Kesh system and found that it appeared to have been already raided; it must have been the handiwork of Gavar Khai and Tola Annax, Taalon thought upon viewing that wreck in the ancient yacht.

"I'm looking for a young teenaged boy who has the exact same skin pigmentation as I do," Taalon announced loudly for all in the bar to hear. "Has anyone seen him recently?"

"I seen a kid like that around here a few days ago," the old human male bartender answered almost immediately from behind the counter ahead of the Sith trio. "He didn't pay his tab before a human male and a female of your pigmentation came in here to try to get him; led into a chase out into the streets of this city that got the human male and the purple female killed while the boy just upped and disappeared."

Taalon's eyes flashed in shock in learning that Khai and Annax were dead. Not only was he surprised that a mere Tyro like Raas could kill two well-trained and more experienced Sabers, but he also regretted being the one who would have to tell Lahka Khai that not only had she lost her daughter, but also her husband. At least he would grant her vengeance after he brought Gavar's killer alive, but not well, back to Kesh.

But where could he start looking?

As if in answer to his thoughts, he looked off to one corner of the bar and found a news report that came all the way from the Core of the galaxy, Coruscant, base and home of the Galactic Alliance and of the Jedi Order. Among the report of the Jedi Temple itself being bombarded by the Alliance fleet up in orbit of Coruscant was the death of one of the Masters and a lightsaber duel between a young human male Jedi and a young Keshiri male Sith.

_Raas_, Taalon thought.

"Thank you for your information," Taalon told the bartender. With that, he motioned to his Sith Saber accomplices and they turned and left the cantina.

~o~

On the moon of Almania that was known as Pydyr, the population was undergoing a deadly unknown epidemic. Quarantine had been enforced by Almanian space forces, but it did not stop a single, solitary vessel that looked like a Yuuzhan Vong ship, or a giant black eye, from sneaking through the blockade; because none in the blockade force could see through the Force shroud that cloaked the Sith Meditation Sphere named Ship.

The blockade was unnecessary either way, for the epidemic was not real. It was merely an illusion cast by the Force sect on Pydyr who were known as the Fallanassi. Their leader, Akanah Norand Goss Pell, was no longer Akanah Norand Goss Pell; instead, their new leader, the powerful Force entity known as Abeloth, was leading them to cast this false epidemic. From here, she would feed off the fear and confusion that this worldwide illusion was feeding her.

Yet Abeloth herself was leaving Pydyr via Ship as well as Callista Ming, casting the Force shroud that made the Meditation Sphere invisible from any sight; an entity like her could be in more than one place at once, especially since she could absorb others into her being and then use them as avatars across the galaxy.

By the time anyone figured out that someone like Pell was not who they said they were, it would be too late... for the whole galaxy.


	5. Chapter 5

What Was Not: Chapter 5

After the _Millennium Falcon_ dropped off Ben to single-handedly engage the purple-skinned Sith, the light freighter turned away and zoomed off for the bombarded Jedi Temple. It soon joined the ranks of the StealthX fighter wing whose survivors were weaving around the lasers and missiles that rained from Coruscant Space Control. The freighter soon began helping all of those StealthXs veer away from the Temple by executing a tactic that wasn't used since the Yuuzhan Vong War; shield-overlapping via proximal distance between vessels. And considering that the StealthXs didn't have any shields, they could use all the help they could get from the _Falcon_.

The lasers and missile strikes that the YT-1300 began to accumulate was severely dwindling away the _Falcon_'s shields, but nevertheless, it provided considerable help to lessen the strikes and losses that the StealthX wing was suffering. Regardless, it wasn't long before the bombardment upon the Jedi Temple soon stopped; with no Jedi in the Temple anymore, it would be a waste of firepower. And Orbital Control obviously wasn't going to endanger civilian lives by firing down upon the fleeing StealthXs just for the sake of wiping out the Jedi Order even under Daala's regime; the odds of missing the tiny fighters would have been too high, and any resultant hits and/or explosions would have caused considerable property damage and/or severe injuries and even losses of lives anyway.

It was only a few minutes before the entire StealthX wing–at least with its survivors, which were about four-fifths of the state of the wing prior to all of its deaths–breached Coruscant's atmosphere. By then, Galactic Alliance starfighters were rushing in for their Jedi enemy, but since the StealthXs were now in space, their cloaks were now active and effective. Almost invisible in the star-studded blackness of space, the StealthXs could overtake their Alliance opponents and attack them with the element of surprise. The _Millennium Falcon_, on the other hand, while unable to cloak itself in space, was a force to be reckoned with in and of herself; her legacy and reputation in combat, combined with the experience of her aging, but still-able, captain, was not to be trifled with even by an official military of the main galactic government.

Regardless, the Jedi Order, and even the _Falcon_ herself, opted not to engage the Alliance's space forces; it would have been a wasteful use of man- and firepower, which would be reserved for the Sith. And besides, their goal was to protect the Alliance and the galaxy overall instead of fighting it. Sure, there were a few explosions in space that signified the losses of StealthXs and general starfighter losses alike, especially on the _Falcon_'s part on account of her visibility, but by the end of the relatively minor engagement in Coruscant's orbit, each of the remaining StealthXs, which were now numbered about more than three-fourths of the wing by the beginning of its formation that day, managed to plot a hyperspace course and escape the system.

When Han Solo began to do the same thing, Luke Skywalker leaned in between him and Leia and said to him, "No, we have to go back for Ben."

Han wordlessly nodded at his brother-in-law without hesitation, then spun the _Falcon_ around and began to travel back through Coruscant's atmosphere with GA starfighters after her.

~o~

The lightsaber duel between Ben Skywalker and Ahri Raas was intense as it progressed in the street that it was taking place at. With the speed of the combatants' movements and the blurs of their lightsabers matching, it was now accruing a considerable audience around the Jedi and Sith teenagers, as if they were street performers. But since this wasn't a street performance at all, five airspeeders of the Coruscant Security Force was naturally blaring their sirens as they rushed in on the scene to end the duel by any means necessary.

Once those speeders arrived, they hovered several meters over the crowd that was there before them before they settled down a considerable distance away from Ben and Ahri. The police officers all stopped out of their vehicles and one of them, a middle-aged Duros female, pulled out a megaphone to amplify her voice. "You two over there, cease and desist your confrontation and stand down." The duel continued regardless. "Cease and desist your confrontation and stand down right now." Again, the duel went on. "This is your last warning; _stand down_!"

When Ben and Ahri refused to even acknowledge the Duros's very presence still, she turned to her fellow officers and said, "Set your blasters to kill."

Without hesitation, all of the cops there, including the Duros female herself, pulled out their weapons and immediately aimed them for the duelling opponents. They fired off their shots, and that was what caused Ben and Ahri to cease their duel and turn away from each other, blocking and reflecting away the shots fired at them. The cops dodged back into their cars to avoid the ricochets that would surely kill them, and seeing that things were getting serious–not that they weren't already–the crowd around the scene began to scatter away in the hopes that they wouldn't become victims of any of the ricochets. That became apparent when a few civilians who were behind those cops actually took those bolts straight into the chests; about six individuals of various species died then, none injured otherwise.

After all of the blastbolts were gone, Ben and Ahri swiftly turned back to each other and continued their lightsaber duel.

"Well, that didn't work, Sarge," the male Twi'lek partner of the Duros female who ordered to shoot Ben and Ahri said to her back in their airspeeder. "So what now?"

"Well, since the crowd is dissipating, I say we just let these two continue to fight it out among themselves, and hope, at the very least, that they manage to kill each other," the Duros replied sardonically.

The police airspeeder on the Twi'lek's side, however, didn't have that idea as it began to zoom forward for the duelling Jedi and Sith. "You wanna radio that to Brazel and Darv?" the Twi'lek asked his partner, referring to the Chadra-Fan and Brubb respectively in the moving police speeder.

But before the Duros sergeant could even actually commence what her partner suggested, Brazel and Darv's airspeeder once again halted Ben and Ahri's duel as the latter two pressed away from each other and leaped over the mobile speeder. And while Ben flipped off the speeder via the other end, Ahri took the trouble to actually carve a circle into the vehicle's roof, causing that section of it to fall through and allow Ahri access into the speeder. He didn't waste a second as a cut a single decapitating stroke across both Brazel and Darv's heads before they had the time to react.

Following their deaths, the airspeeder that Brazel was driving veered off to the left, causing Ahri to nearly lose his balance on top of the out-of-control vehicle. But he stayed on even as the airspeeder crashed into a durasteel wall, sending him flying a few feet toward it. He hit it solidly with his back before flopping down to the windshield, his lightsaher still humming.

But Ben could feel that he was still alive and conscious, just temporarily injured. So he rushed in and just when he was a few meters from the downed Keshiri Sith, he leaped through the air and prepared to deliver a quick killing strike that would end Ahri's life. But the teenaged Sith simply rolled out of the way and ended up off the hood of the speeder as Ben landed on it and stabbed his lightsaber through it. He looked up and found Ahri staring back at him before the Keshiri struck out with his own crimson-bladed saber. Ben blocked the strike, pirouetted it, and then kicked the Sith up the jaw.

The kick sent the Keshiri flying backwards into a flip in which he crashed onto the permacrete. Ben once again took advantage of the moment to leap into the air and prepared to deliver another death strike that wouldn't fail this time. But Ahri recovered from the blow and subsequent landing surprisingly quickly before he once again blocked Ben's incoming strike and used his Jedi opponent's momentum against him as he pushed back, sending the young human crashing back onto the hood of the crashed police speeder behind him.

But Ben rolled back and off the hood just before Ahri could deliver a swipe that would have taken out his legs. The Keshiri then leaped upon the hood and traded a few clashes with Ben before he flipped forward and over Ben, trading at least three strikes before landing behind the Jedi. Ben managed to swivel around quickly to block yet another strike from Ahri, and the duel continued.

With Ahri's back facing the cops, the Duros sergeant decided to lean out her window and aim a shot for the Keshiri. But the Sith's danger sense allowed him to quickly disengage from Ben again and roll off to the side. Ben managed to reflect the bolt away into the wall of the building beside him, causing a blackening scorch mark there. He then leaped after Ahri, who by then was in a crouch. The Sith blocked the next incoming strike, but while doing so, he plopped onto his back and kicked Ben in the solar plexus, sending the Jedi flying back. He crashed into the rear of the crashed speeder behind him and collapsed to the street.

Now that Ben was temporarily down for the count, Ahri leaped to his feet and turned to the police speeders still parked there. He then sent out a Force wave that sent the vehicles toppling back onto their roofs; and since none of those cops were wearing their seatbelts, they all fell on their heads and the resultant impact broke their necks. Ahri felt the satisfactory sense of life simply disappearing from the Force; it wasn't as exquisite as feeling all those Jedi deaths during the Temple bombardment, but it was still enjoyable for what it was worth.

This brief lamenting almost distracted Ahri from the incoming form of Ben Skywalker, who had already gotten up from the ground and was prepared to strike the Keshiri dead again. The latter parried away the former's stabbing attack before delivering a good uppercut to Ben's jaw with his free hand. The Jedi stumbled back from the attack, but was still able to deflect Ahri's own attack barely a second later. By then, the duel continued before they had their blades locked and burning across the ground. The two of them gritted their teeth as they stared each other down; Ben with the stubbornness of the Jedi he was, Ahri with the hatred of the Sith he was.

"I _will_ make you pay for killing Vestara," Ahri said spitefully before they broke off, and they continued to duel mercilessly.

"Who's Vestara?" Ben managed to ask in the heat of the duel.

"The woman I loved!" Ahri cried out, not breaking up his own pattern in the fighting either. "And the one you killed... back on Sinkhole Station!" By those last four words, Ahri and Ben had locked their sabers again before they pushed off from each other.

Once the two of them regained their footing, they instead decided to stare each other down once more. "I killed a lot of Sith on Sinkhole Station," Ben said. "Mind telling me which one this Vestara was?"

Ahri snorted derisively. "Like I would tell you," he said before he let out a battle cry and moved to strike at Ben again.

But before the duel could go on once more, Ahri instead rolled off to the side as a laser strike blasted a small, meter-wide crater where he once stood. The Keshiri then leaped up from the roll and began to run off, simultaneously dodging out of the way when continued bursts of laserfire from above tried to vaporize him from existence. Ben, meanwhile, turned and looked up into the sky to see the _Millennium Falcon_ being the one to bring upon Ahri's death.

Several meters away, Ahri decided to circle back and run for Ben again. The laserfire became more desperate, but Ahri was still adept at dodging and moving out of the way of the incoming fire. When he got close enough to Ben, who raised his saber up, Ahri decided to yell out, "Skywalker! I'm willing... to surrender! Call off... the laserfire!" Ahri managed to say all this while still dodging around Ben.

"And how can I believe you!" Ben asked skeptically.

"How 'bout this?" Ahri asked before he deactivated his lightsaber and threw it far off, managing to use the Force to throw it to the point of the police blockade that he managed to upturn moments earlier even while still dodging.

Raising an eyebrow, Ben took out his commlink and activated it, but not without a two-second hesitation on his part. "Uncle Han?"

"Yeah, kid, what's up?" his uncle's voice came.

"Call off the laserfire," Ben said with a note of regret. "It seems this Sith is willing to surrender."

"Are you serious?" Han asked.

"If he ain't, then he won't have enough time to recall his lightsaber with the Force before I strike him dead," Ben said, seeing how far the Sith weapon was.

"All right," Han said before he cut the comm.

More than a quarter of a minute later, the laserfire stopped, and Ahri collapsed to the street on his back in exhaustion. He breathed in and out heavily as the _Falcon_ began to settle down next to Ben, who was meters away. After the freighter landed, Ben calmly walked over to the downed Keshiri, his lightsaber still active, and once he reached Ahri's side, he brought up the blade close to his throat.

"So... you're serious about surrendering?" Ben asked sardonically.

"Even better," Ahri said. "I'm willing to become a Jedi."

Ben's eyes widened in shock at this statement before they settled into angry disbelief. "I'd laugh right now, but since I'm not in the mood..." He then flicked the blade away from Ahri before deactivating his lightsaber and bringing the butt end of the weapon down upon the Keshiri's head, knocking him out cold.

By then, the sirens of Security Force airspeeders were blaring from the distance. Fortunately, the _Falcon_'s boarding ramp was already down, and Luke and Jaina were already disembarking to get a clearer view of the situation just as Ben was slinging the unconscious Ahri over his shoulder like the burden he was. He then turned to his father and cousin and began walking toward them.

"What's going on here?" Luke asked incredulously.

"I'll explain on the way out of here," Ben said. "We just have to get out of here before the cops catch us."

Luke and Jaina nodded immediately, and turned with him as they began trotting back up the boarding ramp. It was up before Luke, the last one to come aboard, had even reached the top. The instant the ramp was sealed shut with the hull, the _Falcon_ took off for space moments before the cops reached the scene to find the bodies of their dead colleagues and the six civilians who died in the conflict.

Up in orbit of Coruscant, the _Falcon_ once again zoomed through the blockade assembled by Coruscant Orbital Control, just as it had 44 years before from Tatooine, and then 41 years ago from Hoth, without having to fire a single laser or missile upon any of the Alliance ships pursuing it. During this time, Han had Leia check the ship's sensors to see if its hull had any tracking beacons. After Leia denied any such beacons via the sensors, Han pulled down the lever that plunged the ship into the blue sheet of hyperspace.


	6. Chapter 6

What Was Not: Chapter 6

Ahri woke up to find himself bound via stuncuffs by the wrists and ankles against the head- and footholds of the medbay bed that he was lying on. Standing above him with an expectant look was Ben Skywalker.

"Were you just watching me sleep?" Ahri asked groggily in a half-joking tone. The pain around his head still throbbing; even with the knockout that Ben gave him, he probably should have recovered by now. No doubt his captors had him on some kind of drugs to keep him from using the Force to break free.

"Don't flatter yourself," Ben replied sarcastically. "I was expecting you to wake up soon so I could interrogate you."

Ahri sighed. "I was hoping that you were looking over me for the first thing that I was thinking about."

"No, you weren't," Ben said completely serious before he smoothly changed the subject. "Did you really expect me to believe you about wanting to be a Jedi? Do you really expect me to fall for that after all the killing and duelling me back on Coruscant?"

Ahri hesitated to try to come up with even a half-baked answer before he growled in defeat after a moment. "All right, you got me. I just said that so that I wouldn't be blasted into atoms. Of course, that part worked, so I'm not complaining too much about that. But tell me, if you didn't believe me, why'd you drag me along? You could've just left me back on Coruscant to be handed over to the cops."

"Because if I had, you would have killed them as easily as you killed all those other cops even if I had destroyed your lightsaber and/or placed you in binders or stuncuffs," Ben explained. "The Force is a powerful thing, you know," he added sardonically.

"You're telling me," Ahri replied wryly. "So, since you called my bluff, but I'm still alive, what are you gonna do about me? I know Jedi don't kill prisoners who've already surrendered, so... what now?"

"We're meeting up with the survivors from the escape from Coruscant," Ben stated. "Once we've reached the rendezvous point, we're dropping you off, still as a prisoner mind you, and you'll be placed in one of this Jedi Temple's cells."

"And how long am I to stay in one of these cells?" Ahri asked.

"Until you're redeemed from the dark side," Ben answered.

Ahri whistled. "So, basically, the rest of my life then, huh?"

"Yeah, pretty much," Ben replied.

Ahri sighed again. "Why don't you just kill me now? It'll be so much more pleasant of an experience."

"Sorry, I don't take requests from Sith."

"Well, I sold ya on that bid for surrender, didn't I?"

Ben didn't answer. "We'll be at the Jedi base in a few days. So in the meantime, I suggest you get some rest."

"Rest? But I just woke–" Before he could finish that sentence, Ben, who held a needle hidden in the folds of his robes, injected that needle into the side of Ahri's neck, plunging a drug into the Keshiri that knocked him out instantly.

"Nighty-night," Ben said with a mock smile before cleaning the syringe, setting it down on the table at the foot of the medbay bed, and walked out.

~o~

"Unidentified vessel, please identify yourself or prepare to be fired upon," the gruff male voice–most likely a human–said at the other end of the _Emiax_'s bridge comm.

"Coruscant Orbital Control, this is High Lord Sarasu Taalon of the _Emiax_," Taalon introduced him after Leeha Faal patched him through to respond. "I am here on business on behalf of my people."

"Who are?" the voice asked.

Taalon deliberated briefly on revealing the name of his species to the man on the other end before he decided to organically redirect it to ask his own query. "I believe you have seen a member of my race recently. To the best of my memory, he was engaged in a lightsaber duel with a young Jedi Knight his age a few days ago. He is a delinquent among our kind; do you know who I'm talking about?" Taalon wasn't worried about the man on the other line discerning that Raas was a Sith; considering the relative lack of Sith activity in the greater galaxy for the last several decades, it was unlikely that the individual that he was talking to would be aware of the Sith. He might mistake Raas for a Jedi at best, if anything, which was fine for Taalon; the little brat was a traitor to the Lost Tribe anyway.

"Oh, yeah, I remember him," the voice said. "The last the galaxy saw of him, he was defeated by that young Jedi, Ben Skywalker, and taken away thanks to the _Millennium Falcon_. We couldn't track it in hyperspace, but we're pretty sure that wherever he is now, he's most likely a prisoner of the Jedi already."

"Really?" Taalon asked.

"Yeah."

"Well, then, thank you for your time, sir," Taalon said. "My crew and I shall take our leave of the system, and we'll locate him ourselves."

But before Taalon could issue the order for the _Emiax_ to leave the Coruscant system, the voice at the other end of the comm said, "I wouldn't worry about that, High Lord Taalon. We already dispatched a search party from among our military to find the Jedi Order and the _Millennium Falcon_. We'll find your delinquent, don't you worry about that."

"Well, if it's all the same to you, my crew and I would prefer to look for our juvenile alone," Taalon said patiently.

"Well, if you insist," the voice said. "But before you leave, I, on behalf of the Galactic Alliance Defense Force, would like to ask you to dock at one of our orbital facilities so that we may question you regarding your people."

"Why is this the business of the Galactic Alliance?" Taalon asked, slightly worried.

"Well, considering the nature of this delinquent, given that he could hold his own against a well-trained Jedi Knight like Ben Skywalker, we'd like to ask a few questions regarding that matter," the voice said.

Taalon grimaced. "I think not," he said as he signalled for the ship to turn away and exit the system via hyperspace.

"High Lord Taalon, this will be your only warning here," the voice said. "Heave to, or we will open fire."

Taalon signalled for the comm to be cut, then ordered, "Drop a compliment of ten missiles, all deactivated, for our friends."

After the _Emiax_ turned away from Coruscant, several missiles were launched, but with no trail behind them, they were invisible in space. A barrage of laserfire from the Galactic Alliance line opened up to track the _Emiax_, but instead, a hit one of the missiles caused a chain reaction that caused a grand explosion that served as a blanket of brief fire. It was enough for the _Emiax_ to use as cover to launch into hyperspace without trouble.

~o~

The world that Ship was disembarking from under the Force cloak projected by his current owner, Abeloth, still in the form of Callista Ming, was Nam Chorios, homeworld of the Theran Listeners. With one of Abeloth's latest avatars on the world now masquerading as the Listeners' leader, the Force-powered entity had secured yet another sect of Force users under her control.

With no one to stop her, it was only a matter of time, Abeloth thought, before she would rule this entire galaxy.

And maybe even this universe.

~o~

When Ahri awoke for what had to be the fifth or sixth time during the _Millennium Falcon_'s trip to the Jedi base that Ben promised they were travelling to, the young Jedi Knight immediately gave him another injection in the neck. But instead of instantly passing out like he had several times before, Ahri simply felt weak; if he did get up, his legs would feel wobbly, notwithstanding the fact that he hasn't stood for a few days, and he still wouldn't feel he'd be able to use the Force for a while.

"We're here," Ben said as he began to unshackle Ahri's wrists and ankles.

Now free, Ahri decided to use almost all his strength to push himself up into a sitting position and swing his legs over the bed; evidently, Ben wasn't going to help him walk. The Keshiri then lowered his feet to the ground and pushed himself off. Just as he predicted, he was feeling slightly wobbly, but he would manage for the time being.

"We're not much in a hurry," Ben assured him in a tone that lacked any such sentiment as he slowly, very slowly, began leading him out of the medbay by the Sith's side. "I've been assigned to lead you to your cell, and since we're not on any time constraints here, I'll just let you take your time on this."

"Why?" Ahri asked. "You enjoy my company or something?"

"What makes you think that?" Ben asked sardonically.

"Well, if you don't wanna make your job easier and faster by helping me along, surely, there must be some kinda reason for that," Ahri said. He then looked to Ben with a mock smile. "Like having me around as a friend?"

Ben scoffed. "My dad didn't say anything about actually helping you in this; only that I should bring you to your cell."

Ahri turned back to face the exit again, and they were now barely two meters from it. "I thought that's what you Jedi did. Help people, that is."

"Well, we're not exactly in the business of helping Sith, if that's what you mean," Ben said evenly.

"Even if it would make it more convenient for the Jedi?" Ahri asked.

"_Especially_ not then," Ben enunciated.

By now, they exited the medbay, and were continuing down the hallway of the _Falcon_ to the boarding ramp. "So you Jedi are so self-righteous in your ideals in defending the weak and such, but when it comes to drugged-up Sith like me, then you won't even help me up if I trip, eh?"

"I did enough for you just by saving your ungrateful, dark-side using ass back on Coruscant, so if you trip, you're on your own there," Ben said sternly.

"Hm. Well, that seems kinda unfair," Ahri remarked.

"You Sith talk about domination and enslavement of others, and you're telling me it's unfair if I leave you to pick yourself up when you fall," Ben said wryly. "Yeah, that makes sense."

"Well, how 'bout we make this clear," Ahri said, casting a brief but gazing look at Ben. "The fact that I'm being as nice to you as I am is a clear indication of my cooperation in this considering what you did to me and my life."

"What, make you a prisoner?"

"That, and that you not only killed the woman I loved, but also destroyed any chance of rejoining my people without me risking the possibility of execution on their part," Ahri said in a reserved tone.

"Oh, I'm _so_ sorry to hear that," Ben said sarcastically. "You put this all on yourself, you know. You and the rest of the Sith. You just _have_ to make everything so damn difficult for the galaxy. The Jedi do the best they can to ensure peace and justice all around, but you Sith want nothing more than tyranny and oppression on your parts."

After a moment of silence, Ahri asked, "You finished?"

"You have anything more to add?" Ben asked back.

"You answer my question first."

"I would say fair enough, but considering who you are, I won't."

"But you just did."

"Shut up," Ben said.

"Fine, I was gonna do that anyway," Ahri said in a resigned tone.

"Good. That'll just make things easier from this point on," Ben remarked as he and Ahri reached the open boarding ramp; by now, Luke, Han, Leia, and Jaina had already disembarked to meet with the remaining Jedi Council members in the Temple on this planet, and they had been courteous enough to leave the ramp down for Ben and Ahri to disembark.

Ahri raised an eyebrow at Ben's last remark before they continued down. Once they reached the ground, Ben closed the hatch back up and continued with Ahri across the Temple grounds.

The Keshiri prisoner looked at his surroundings; beneath his feet was lush grass, a thriving, clean forest all around, and near-cloudless blue skies. Ahead of him and Ben was the Jedi Temple of this world.

"Nice place," Ahri commented. "I bet people would actually pay to be imprisoned here on a world like this."

"I thought you said you'd shut up," Ben interjected.

~o~

"I'm glad to see that the majority of this Council has made it off of Coruscant to convene for this meeting," Grand Master Skywalker said to the Masters around the circular desk before he seated himself. "Though Masters Hamner and Horn will be greatly missed in the time to come."

Everyone else nodded in silent agreement. Even after Hamner turned on the Order itself for Daala, he was still a beloved Master among the Council who they would all grieve for. And of course they had already missed Corran; no doubt his widow, Mirax, had figured out the news by now, and with her son and daughter still encased in carbonite back on Coruscant, she only had her father, Booster Terrik, to turn to.

"But this is not the time to despair," Luke said. "We can't afford it now. Not only do we have this new force of Sith to contend, but after all that occurred on Coruscant, no doubt the Galactic Alliance will now be our enemies. I have no doubt we'll still have friends and allies among them, such as Wedge Antilles and Tycho Celchu, who would do all they could in their power to help us like they did when we fought Darth Caedus in the last war. But as it is, we can't rely on them for the moment."

"And it will be difficult for the Hapes Consortium to shelter us for long since they're still on relatively good terms with the Alliance," Octa Ramis chimed in. "It probably won't be long before Daala finds out where we are and she'll no doubt pressure Queen Mother Tenel Ka into giving us over back to the Alliance. I'm not exactly sure if the Hapans want to risk another war with the GA at this point."

"There's also the matter of the psychotic Jedi Knights," Cilghal interjected. "Even after my breakthrough in finding out that what they all had in common was that they were all children sheltered away in the Maw during the Yuuzhan Vong War, I still haven't found out the reasons yet."

"I'm sure you'll find out soon, Master Cilghal," Luke assured her, though the words seemed empty to the Mon Calamari Jedi Master. "In either case, though, we will have to free Valin and Jysella Horn from Daala's clutches somehow. It won't be easy, and even if and when you do find a cure for this illness, Cilghal, the shock of hearing that their father is dead will be a heavy weight upon them."

"It will be sssad for them, but necessary," Saba Sebatyne commented.

"Then, of course, there's the matter of this Sith prisoner we have," Kyle Katarn said. "What fate do you judge necessary, Master Skywalker?"

"While his surrender was a little too convenient for my tastes, I'm not worried about him," Luke answered. "If anything, having as a prisoner will be convenient of understanding these Sith more."

"Are you sure he'll cooperate?" Saba asked.

"If it means his life? Of course," Luke responded.


	7. Chapter 7

What Was Not: Chapter 7

Ahri sat, twiddling his thumbs, on the cot provided for him in the jail cell of the underground of this Jedi Temple as he contemplated his next move. He had vowed on Vestara's death that he would avenge her, and that meant killing the Skywalkers, especially the younger one, whose name he still hadn't learned yet, he noted. But now that he was trapped in this cell, which somehow disabled his abilities to access the Force, he didn't know what he was going to do to get out and fulfill his avowed mission.

He should have taken his chances back on Coruscant and tried harder to kill the younger Skywalker, he thought, even if he were definitely gunned down by his uncle's vessel. Now, as far as Ahri knew, he would be trapped here forever; there was no way he would ever convert to the light side, especially when he knew that Vestara's killer still lived. Really, Ahri's best chance was a force of the Lost Tribe arriving here in a matter of time to battle the Jedi and maybe even discover him by happenstance if they decided to actually raid this Temple; Ahri would be lucky if they didn't decide to bombard the Temple, similar to how the Galactic Alliance destroyed Coruscant's Jedi Temple, and subsequently have him buried alive.

With that, Ahri laid back down on his cot and decided to wait.

He didn't wait long, for five seconds after he laid down, his entire cell started to shake from the sounds of booms running through the structure of the Jedi Temple. He immediately sat up and rushed to the door of his cell, where he glanced through the bars that were at head level. He saw a few Jedi, apprentices and Knights alike, run by his cell in both directions. Ahri figured they were going up top to meet whatever threat was attacking this Temple. He then shifted his thoughts back to the matter at hand; Ahri guessed that the Sith were finally attacking like he predicted, but when he reached out into the Force to feel the familiar presences of his fellow Sith, he instead felt presences that couldn't sense him in return.

Ahri concluded that the Jedi Temple was being attacked by the Galactic Alliance instead.

~o~

Considering how the Galactic Alliance caught the Jedi Order flatfooted in their own Temple back on Coruscant by bombarding it from orbit before they could launch, the Order decided to remedy that error by having a chunk of the Hapan flotilla defend Shedu Maad around the planet. When the Alliance forces came out of hyperspace and traveled through the icy corridor of the Maad system, they soon opened fire on the Hapan line. The latter force immediately began to fire back, and before and during the opening salvos, the Jedi on the ground were noted of the arrival of this threat by their friends defending them in orbit. In spite of the defense, though, several stray hits, such as some lasers and missiles, managed to whiz past to gain more heat through the atmosphere before crashing down to hit the Temple.

Regardless, dozens of members in the Temple, including all of the Masters, Jaina Solo, and various other Knights and apprentices, at that immediately scrambled for their StealthXs and launched for the planet's skies. Once in orbit, the StealthXs managed to overtake the Galactic Alliance line from both above and below them, considering that they were distracted by the Hapan flotilla to notice them cloaked against the star-studded blackness of space. They soon ended up behind the Alliance line, and with the element of surprise on their side, the Jedi opened fire from the Alliance's rear.

Within the first five seconds or so, the GA fleet immediately assigned portions of their fleet who were either only somewhat damaged by the attacks from behind, or who weren't hit at all, to turn around and deal with the near-invisible StealthXs while the rest dealt with the Hapans. But regardless of their responses, the Alliance fleet found themselves outmatched, outnumbered, outgunned, and outsmarted within the first few minutes of the battle. But while they still had a chance to recover and manage a victory against their enemies, it seemed that they would be lucky if they could even reach a stalemate.

~o~

"Blast it!" Daala nearly roared in her office as she watched holocam footage of the battle over Shedu Maad. "It seems that the Queen Mother and Skywalker are much more clever than I believed; they _knew_ that I would circumvent Tenel Ka's authority so I could finally wreak justice upon the Jedi, and they prepared for it!"

"And, I might add, what's worse is that even if the Jedi and the Hapan fleet supporting them are defeated, you still have committed an act of war against the Consortium, Chief," Wynn Dorvan, the only other person in the room to view the footage, commented from the seat across from Daala.

"Thanks, Wynn," Daala sarcastically said. Then her tone turned serious with, "But still, no matter what the outcome, this government can still afford to wage a war even after the one with Caedus. The Hapans and the Jedi, assuming that their number can even survive this altercation to begin with, will have to wage a two-pronged war against us _and_ this new Sith group."

"Won't these Sith also become a problem for us?" Dorvan asked. "In fact, like the Jedi said, won't they become a problem for the galaxy overall."

"Well, like I told the Masters' Council and the others, we'll take care of it when they become a real problem," Daala said through her teeth. "As it is, the Jedi are our top priority. And now, thanks to this, so are the Hapans."

Dorvan sighed.

"You still think not allowing the Jedi to leave was bad idea, Wynn?" Daala asked.

"Truthfully?"

Daala nodded.

"I think it's the dumbest idea you've made, Chief, even with those Knights of theirs going crazy."

"I see," Daala said patiently. "So you think I should take their bid for alliance against the Sith?"

"Of course," Dorvan replied. "You could always sue for peace. With these Sith coming into being in this galaxy, we can't afford to have the Alliance divided against different enemies. For all we know, this could be the very thing that could bring this whole government down!"

"Sounds like you think you can make a better Chief of State than I, Wynn," Daala commented in a reserved tone.

"Well, I... believe that I'm certainly capable of fulfilling the task, ma'am," Dorvan said.

"Again, moreso than I?"

Dorvan hesitated, but he answered. "Yes."

Daala grimaced. "Then let's see how you'll do in my position then."

Dorvan's eyes widened in shock at this. "I'm sorry?"

"I leave the task up to, Wynn. Or should I say Chief of State Dorvan."

Dorvan stammered. "B-b-but why me?"

"You say you can make a better Chief of State than I, I'll leave you as temporary leader of the Alliance for, say, a week," Daala said. "If you manage to maintain this government in a partnership with the Jedi, who still have those crazy Knights among them mind you, and the Hapes Consortium by then, then I'll leave you to fill that role until you retire. But if I see the first hints of this government falling into ruin at any point after that, I will have you arrested and detained indefinitely for insubordination and illegal takeover of the Galactic Alliance."

"But... you're allowing me this position, ma'am," Dorvan said.

"For now," Daala replied. "Until then..." She then stood up and vacated her seat for Dorvan. "This government is in your hands."


	8. Chapter 8

What Was Not: Chapter 8

Admiral Turk Brand gripped the armrests of his command chair tightly as his flagship, the _Cha Niathal_, rocked hard from nearly all sides on account of the barrages that the vessel was receiving from the Jedi StealthXs and the Hapan flotilla in orbit of Shedu Maad. He stared out the viewport of his flagship with an equal mix of disappointment and frustration upon staring at the royal fleet backed up by the practically-invisible StealthXs; although the battle had reached something of a stalemate as it continued to proceed, the Galactic Alliance fleet was still taking a pounding, and right now, the _Niathal_ was none the worse for wear, Brand feared.

As if to exemplify his anger over what he figured was an impending loss, his right armrest console beeped. Rolling his eyes in annoyance, he pressed the button to respond. "This is Admiral Brand. Who is this?"

"Admiral Brand, this is temporary Galactic Alliance Chief of State Wynn Dorvan," the voice on the other line replied. "Chief Daala has voluntarily vacated her position as head of this government and the responsibilities for leading the greater galaxy has fallen upon my shoulders. In moments, all official databanks within the Alliance computers, both military, such as your own, and otherwise will receive official confirmation of what I am telling you."

"That's great," Brand said offhandedly, "but could you have told us at a better time, Chief Dorvan? My fleet and I are currently in a pitched battle against the Jedi Order and a flotilla of the Hapes Consortium, and we're not doing so hot. So if you don't mind-"

"Actually, I do mind, Admiral, for I am ordering you to surrender before the Jedi and the Hapans so that we may work together," Dorvan interrupted.

Brand was too disciplined as an officer to remark with, _Are you serious?!_ So instead, he said, "Yes, sir. Will that be all?"

"Yes," Dorvan affirmed. "That will be all, Admiral." With that, Dorvan signed off.

~o~

"So what do you say, Grand Master Skywalker?" Dorvan asked as he spoke with Luke and Tenel Ka on comm. "Queen Mother Djo?"

"I agree with this," the Queen Mother said first.

"And so do I," Luke answered immediately thereafter.

"But there is one thing that is on Admiral Daala's mind, Master Skywalker," Dorvan said.

Luke put a hand up to halt what Dorvan would say next. "The Jedi Order will handle our own Knights should anymore fall into this mysterious psychosis."

"Very well," Dorvan nodded.

"Unfortunately, given our presumed time constraints," Luke said, "we cannot arrange any such formalities as a treaty that will cement this partnership to defeat the impending Sith threat. This will have to be informal for the time being."

"Grand Master Skywalker is correct, Chief Dorvan," Tenel Ka chimed in. "Given what the Order has personally shared with me, even I agree that such arrangements can be bypassed for the necessity that is the safety of this galaxy. That is, of course, you're willing to bypass this arrangement."

Dorvan sighed. "Admiral Daala will not care about this, but I trust you, Master Skywalker. I will inform Admiral Brand of this as soon as this call is done."

"Then do you have anything more to add, Chief?" Luke asked.

Dorvan nodded. "Yes. I just wanted to say that I'm sorry for the losses of all your Jedi who fell before the Alliance fleet from Coruscant onwards, notably Master Horn. I regret to say that I witnessed his demise. I am sorry that I did nothing to stop it, but I couldn't-"

"No need to say anymore, Wynn," Luke interjected with as personable a tone as he could manage. "I understand."

Dorvan nodded. "Then I have nothing more to say. Dorvan out." He then signed off.

~o~

After the Jedi Order and the Hapes Consortium agreed with the Galactic Alliance to cease the hostilities that sprung up because of the recent battle over Shedu Maad, the combined fleets made it out through the Maad system via the way they came before they exited through hyperspace to confront the Sith threat. Relatively few Jedi, such as Knights Sothais Saar, Avinoam Arelis, and Turi Altamik, remained behind to guard the Temple.

Hours after the fleets left the system, Ahri Raas felt the Force return to him in his cell. Curious but excited, he leaped up from his cot and stood in front of the door. But before he could do something like unleash a Force blast that could blow the door outward and send him free, that door suddenly blew inward, forcing the Keshiri to jump out of the way to his left in a roll as the door crashed on top of his cot.

Now in a crouch, Ahri looked back at the blown-in door and found Saar and Arelis standing there with expressions that equally mixed fear and anger. Arelis unhooked and activated his lightsaber before he stalked into the room, holding the blade before Ahri as he advanced. The Keshiri, in turn, backed up into the wall behind him as he crawled back on his hands like a crab.

"Where's the Sith, imposter?" Arelis asked threateningly.

"Imposter?" Ahri asked inquisitively. "What are you talking about?"

"You know _exactly_ what I'm talking about," Arelis enunciated as he brought the tip of his blade closer to Ahri's throat, making the Keshiri sweat a little.

"No, actually, I don't," Ahri replied nervously. "I really don't."

"Oh, yeah?" Arelis asked in a sarcastic tone. "Your Force presence sure indicates otherwise."

"My _Force_ presence?" Ahri asked. "My Force presence has always been the same since I was born! Can you please tell me what you're talking about?!"

"Fine, if you're not willing to cooperate..." Arelis trailed off as he raised his lightsaber, prepared to deliver a death blow with his blade.

Ahri tensed in anticipation of his death, but suddenly, Arelis stopped before he could bring his weapon down to end the Keshiri's life. He stared back at Ahri more in confusion this time than with menace.

Then he deactivated his lightsaber, promptly hooked it back onto his belt, and then unexpectedly kicked Ahri unconscious with a boot heel up the jaw.

And meanwhile, just outside Shedu Maad's Jedi Temple, Ship the Sith Meditation Sphere had just landed and Abeloth, now having shed the disguise of Callista Ming, disembarked with her truly hideous, monstrous appearance in full view for all those who would have been there to see. She walked leisurely into the Temple where the number of Jedi apprentices and Knights, all who were young enough to be secured in the Maw less than two decades earlier, lined up to either side of the hallways for their "reunion" with her.

One by one, Abeloth began absorbing the life forces out of each Jedi throughout the Temple.


	9. Chapter 9

What Was Not: Chapter 9

When Ahri woke up, his eyes immediately widened from their dreary and groggy state to complete fear and terror as he watched a monstrous, grey tentacled being envelop Avinoam Arelis in its embrace at the exit to his cell. From his angle, still sitting up against the wall beside his cot, he couldn't tell what the being was doing to the Jedi Knight, but he didn't have time to think further on the matter as the... _entity_, as he thought of it, ended its embrace with Arelis and threw his now-limp body off to the side. In spite of the visual distraction provided by the grotesque being before him, Ahri felt that Arelis had no Force presence left in him; he was dead.

That was all the thought that Ahri gave to Arelis's permanent condition as he stared at the entity before him. Now that he could fully see it, he saw that it had tiny arms at its sides that extended its long tentacles; it had a flat nose, a wide smile that stretched from ear to ear, and eyes that appeared to be bottomless wells. The only things that could be discerned from those orbs were tiny pinpricks of light, like stars viewed millions of light years away. It was those eyes that truly horrified Ahri as he stared into them.

"Ahri," the creature said in a familiar feminine voice that did nothing to dissuade Ahri's rational fear of it. "It is me. Do you not remember? I have returned so that we can be together."

Then Ahri found a face to connect to the voice. He remembered it from several weeks earlier when he and the rest of the strike team were on the voracious jungle planet looking for the Sith Meditation Sphere known as Ship.

"Abeloth," Ahri murmured.

The creature nodded. "Good. Now that we have reacquainted, it is time to truly join." With that, she said no more as she crept toward Ahri.

The Keshiri already had a pretty good idea, he thought, of what Abeloth would do to him; from just catching a brief glance off to the side to remind himself of Arelis's body, he looked back to Abeloth, still approaching him, and he decided to act now.

Stretching out his hand, he used the Force to pull Arelis's lightsaber from his utility belt and it rocketed for the Keshiri calling to it. But Abeloth, simply from judging what Ahri would do, swiftly swiped a tentacle to the lightsaber, breaking it away from the Sith's concentration and sending it to the opposite side of the cot that Ahri was sitting against. Nevertheless, it was an improvement; Abeloth didn't stand in the way of him and the saber this time. So he dodged the tentacle she sent for him in a desperate attempt to catch the Sith, and he leaped over the cot, grabbing the lightsaber as he rolled across the ground.

He then sprung up into a crouch, spun around, and activated his lightsaber as he stood up to face Abeloth.

The entity, after looking at the blue blade of the saber, stared back at Ahri and laughed. "Do you honestly believe, young one, that that weapon will protect you? I am beyond that."

"Well, I'd certainly like to see that," Ahri said before he moved for the door.

In response, Abeloth struck out a tentacle. Ahri swiped at it with his commandeered lightsaber blade and severed it. The entity screamed in pain and agony from the cut, which allowed Ahri to speed in and impale the saber. The screech that Abeloth emitted again was earsplitting, but the Keshiri endured it as he ran his saber up through her body. After the blade managed to sever Abeloth's left shoulder from her body, Ahri finished her off by completely decapitating her. The entity's body then fell to the ground to join its other two pieces before it reverted to the appearance of a striking-looking human woman with close-cropped brown hair who appeared to be in her fifties or sixties.

At that, Ahri felt the essences of each life force that Abeloth had absorbed in this Temple ease completely into the Force.

Throughout the other planets in the galaxy that Abeloth had already embedded her avatars on, they all emitted a unified screech that signified their shared pain. For that agony that they all felt, they were just a little less powerful then.

~o~

Several hours into hyperspace, each Jedi in the fleet going after the Lost Tribe of the Sith felt a horrible pain as they all sensed a mass disturbance in the Force. When they all recovered, they came back to themselves with the realization that every Jedi left in the Temple of Shedu Maad was dead.

About a couple minutes later, the fleet dropped out of hyperspace to prepare for another run. The Jedi members, though, decided to take the advantage to open communications between each other, briefly discuss about what they just felt, and when they were all done, Luke was the one who was asked what should be done now.

"Whatever happened back on Shedu Maad cannot take precedence over this mission," Luke said over the comms. "Even if whoever, or whatever, that committed this atrocity gets away with this in the short term, we need to focus our efforts on the Sith. The perpetrator, or perpetrators, of this crime will have to, unfortunately, be dealt with at a later time."

"Why can't we, the Jedi, return to Shedu Maad to deal with it ourselves, and leave the Galactic Alliance and the Hapans, along with the Imperial fleet we're rendezvousing with, to deal with the Sith?" Jaina Solo asked.

"Even if that combined fleet's man- and firepower significantly dwarfs the Sith's own forces, the Sith have the Force on their side, and that in itself guarantees that they can win," Luke responded. "And even if it doesn't, we can't risk the chance that it can."

"But what if whatever killed the Jedi on Shedu Maad is a threat equal to, or even greater, than these new Sith?" Ben Skywalker asked. "After all, anything that can kill all those Jedi like that deserves some serious attention."

"Again, the Sith threat is too well known and to large to be ignored, as I said," Luke said. "This new threat will, unfortunately, have to be put on the backburner."

"I wonder why _that_ sounds familiar," Jaina remarked before the fleet went into hyperspace.

~o~

Ahri exited Shedu Maad's Jedi Temple without any trouble, given that all the Jedi here were already dead and nothing more than corpses strewn about here and there, and just as he was finally outside, he saw Ship parked there.

_Tyro Raas_, Ship's voice telepathically communed to Ahri. _It is good to see you again_.

_Yeah, yeah, I bet_, Ahri thought sarcastically. _Give me one good reason why I should trust you. It's quite clear you brought Abeloth here_.

_If you couldn't trust me, then why am I still here? I could just as well fly into the air and kill you with some well-placed barrages of firepower._

_Good point_, Ahri replied. _Still, why did you betray us? Why were you serving that thing?_

_Her power dwarfs the Lost Tribe too much_, Ship responded. _Even if I wanted to serve the Tribe, which I do, by the way, I have no choice but to serve her will; I was designed for that_.

"So now that she's dead, you can serve us again, can you?" Ahri asked out loud.

_You still consider yourself a part of the Lost Tribe, even after your treachery and abandonment of them?_

"Fair enough. Am I still a Sith under your judgment though?"

_Of course. But to answer your previous query, I still can't serve either you or the Lost Tribe, for Abeloth is still alive in other avatars across the galaxy._

"Avatars? What are you talking about?"

_I will explain later, while we are in hyperspace. We must leave; while I do not sense the Jedi returning in spite of the losses that even I have felt, it is safer if we both depart nevertheless_.

"I thought you still served Abeloth?" Ahri asked.

_I am not in her proximity to any of her avatars right now_, Ship answered. _So for this, I can at least serve the Sith, mainly you, of course, by getting you far away from an establishment of the Jedi_. _So come aboard now_.

Ahri nodded before he approached Ship. The Meditation Sphere unfurled its ramp, and the Keshiri climbed aboard. Soon, after the ramp was furled back up, Ship launched into the sky for space.


	10. Chapter 10

When Ship came out of hyperspace, Ahri looked out through the transparent panel at Ship's front that allowed him to view the white-studded blackness of space. But instead of the view being dominated by such a field, the young Keshiri Sith's eyes widened in terror as he stared back at the site of the _Emiax_ in front of Ship.

Ahri gulped in terror. _I'm doomed_, he thought.

_Perhaps not_, Ship communed. _I sense High Lord Taalon's intentions; he wants you alive_.

"That doesn't necessarily mean a good thing," Ahri replied out loud.

_No, it does not_, Ship responded.

~o~

The Galactic Alliance-Hapan-Jedi fleet came out of hyperspace just in time to see the amassed armada of the Lost Tribe of the Sith waiting to do battle against them in orbit.

"This is where the fun begins," Ben Skywalker murmured to himself in the cockpit of his StealthX.

"Cut the chatter, Stealth Three," the voice of Ben's father, Luke, said over the comm. "All flights, report in." When everyone did, Luke continued with, "Lock S-foils in attack position, and attack on my mark."

In no time, capital ships on both sides opened fire on each other, prompting starfighter squadrons on both sides to rush in and engage in an all-out brawl.

~o~

When Ship's organic-like boarding ramp unfurled onto the hangar deck of the _Emiax_, High Lord Sarasu Taalon wasted no time as he climbed aboard and stomped over to Ahri. The younger Keshiri turned and stood up with an obvious look of fear betraying the feelings that were already emanating from his Force presence. Before he knew it, Taalon smacked him across the face, and sent him sprawling across Ship's deck.

"You treacherous little dog!" Taalon screamed. "You led the Jedi back to Kesh, and now thanks to you, the entire Tribe is engaged in battle against them and their allies over our homeplanet!"

"And you're not back there helping our kind?" Ahri remarked wryly; even though he was scared about Taalon punishing him for his abandonment of the Lost Tribe, he at least wanted to defy him by openly insulting him.

"I would say the same about you, Raas," Taalon said. "But as it was, Grand Lord Vol's orders for me were specific; even at the cost of our forces, I was to bring you back alive. But that, of course, is aside the point. What isn't is the fact that you not only abandoned your own people, but you also killed two of your own, and brought about the galaxy's full awareness of the Sith thanks to your duel with that Jedi back on Coruscant!"

"Too bad you can't kill me until we get back to Kesh, eh?" Ahri remarked. "If the Tribe will still be there."

Taalon fumed at what Ahri was implying. "The Lost Tribe will not lose this day, Raas, or any day, even with your betrayal."

_You really think so, do you, Lord Taalon?_ Ship's voice reverberated between Ahri and Taalon.

"What do you mean, Ship?" Taalon asked.

_Your assertion that we would not lose against the Jedi _alone_ could be justified if not for the fact that they have more allies and firepower on their side_, Ship explained. _Both the Jedi and the Sith have the force, but the Jedi have superior numbers to boot_.

"You think we will lose after all?" Taalon asked.

_The Lost Tribe of the Sith would be lucky if there would be any survivors from Kesh, Lord Taalon. Either way, the Tribe has already lost_.

Taalon's face dropped in horror before he looked to the deck in abject hopelessness. "And the Sith will die."

_Just because the Tribe will be broken at best does not mean that the Sith will die_, Ship said.

"What?" Ahri and Taalon both asked simultaneously.

_There is another sect of Sith, who, given the circumstances, are far more powerful, and given time, they will come about to amass a great army that will one day conquer the Jedi, the Galactic Alliance, and dwarf any other galactic power for domination of life everywhere,_ Ship explained. _If you want, I can take what remnants of the Lost Tribe are left, particularly you, to these other Sith_.

"What about Abeloth?" Ahri asked. "She's still a threat, isn't she?"

"Abeloth?" Taalon asked.

_Abeloth will be taken care of in the long run_, Ship said. _Even if the Jedi fail in stopping her, the Sith will succeed_.

"Who's Abeloth?" Taalon asked.

Ahri gave a brief description of her, from what he knew, to the High Lord. When the younger Keshiri finished his description, Taalon's face fell even further than when Ship informed him that the Lost Tribe will be defeated at Kesh.

"How long does the galaxy have before she could be invincible?" Taalon asked Ship.

_I am not sure, but I would estimate at least half a year_, Ship replied.

"Can she be defeated in that time?" Taalon asked.

_I did say that even if the Jedi failed to stop her, the Sith will succeed. There is no need to worry, Lord Taalon_.

"Well, even if that's the case, I prefer we not waste time," Taalon said. "Take us to these other Sith, Ship."

_Having second thoughts about your allegiance?_ Ship inquired.

Taalon made a wry face. "Given what you just told us, I think it's pointless if I paid anymore homage to the Tribe."

"So does that mean I don't have to face punishment for my 'betrayal?'" Ahri asked.

Taalon sighed. "Yes, you don't have to face any punishment, Tyro Raas."

Ahri smirked in triumph.

~o~

The Battle of Kesh was only a few hours, but in the end, the Lost Tribe of the Sith were defeated.

Much of their armada was decimated in orbit around their homeplanet. What few survivors and stragglers remained in the face of their enemy knew that all was lost, so they figuratively ran for the hills as they escaped out into hyperspace. The ground parties that the Alliance-Hapan-Jedi fleet commenced encountered no resistance as they scoured the cities and began arresting everyone; all of the Lost Tribe Sith members were either part of the battle or elsewhere, which meant that the non-Force sensitive populace that remained surrendered without even putting up a fight.

By the end of that day, all of the prisoners were rounded up into the transports that would take them back to Coruscant so that their fates for being involved with the Sith could be determined. The next day, when everything was ready, the remaining forces of the Lost Tribe's victorious enemies blasted into hyperspace to return to the GA capital.

~o~

A few days later, the _Emiax_ dropped out of hyperspace into the Korriban system, and there, before Taalon's eyes, was a world where he felt the dark side of the Force encumber his own presence in a way that Kesh could never do.

The _Emiax_'s comm console beeped. When it was answered, a male, intimidating voice said, "Welcome, fellow Sith. Please feel free to land anywhere you please."

"Thank you," Taalon said personally to the comm before he signaled for it to be cut off.

With that, the _Emiax_ prepared to descend through the atmosphere.

~o~

In the _Emiax_'s hangar bay, Ahri, in elation as he felt the darkness of Korriban, knelt in Ship's cockpit; he wanted to stay here because the Meditation Sphere gave him that option, which even Taalon couldn't take away from him. His face was lit in anticipation to meet these other Sith.

_Now... you will be a true Sith, Ahri. And you _will _attain vengeance for Vestara's death_.

At that, Ahri foresaw it through the Force; the Jedi Order and the Galactic Alliance in ruins; the former's Temple irreparably burned to the ground; Coruscant embattled, with the Sith's ships being the only ones to roam the world's skies, signifying their victory; and before him, among a mass of Jedi corpses, such as Luke Skywalker and Jaina Solo, lay the mangled body of Vestara's killer, Ben Skywalker.

_Oh, yes_, Ahri thought in utter happiness. _I will make it up to you, Vestara. I will make it up to you_.

THE END.


End file.
